Christmas 2022 in Chicago

After a few years in Arizona, a “warm” Christmas just doesn’t feel the same. We decided that Chicago was would be the perfect place to get a white Christmas, go to a few classic holiday events, and of course see family!

Our work schedules worked out that we were able to spend a week in Chicago, so we flew out the weekend before Christmas. Our Delta flight out was very smooth, we even signed up for CLEAR so we can test how useful it is for the airports we use regularly (we don’t expect PHX to be a valuable airport for CLEAR since TSA Pre-Check lines are generally empty).

Throughout the week we spent a lot of time visiting with family, playing new games (Nathan is not allowed to be a Ghost playing Mysterium anymore), watching Christmas movies, and finally exchanging gifts with everyone.

Living in Chicago, means we have many favorite stops for food, and we were able to visit them all during this trip:

Giordanos – Best Chicago style pizza, especially if you want some cheese! Since they closed their Phoenix location, fresh is much better than the frozen pizza we had them ship to us when we get the craving.
Gumari Thai – Our favorite Thai restaurant, which began my love of Peanut Sauce. It was even the same waitress, Apple.
Portillo’s/Barnelli’s – While we are lucky enough to have Portillo’s to our hearts content, we don’t get Barnelli’s which means we had to stop by, so Nathan could get his favorite BBQ ribs. (Don’t ask me how the best ribs are served at an Italian restaurant, only available at some locations of a Chicago hot dog restaurant… but it works!)
Wildberry – Amazing breakfast restaurant, especially if you have a sweet tooth.
The Village Grill – While maybe not the world’s greatest diner, there is sentimental value stopping by Nathan’s favorite diner.

Unfortunately, winter travel is not exactly reliable so as we were about to head to the airport to leave, we learned our flight was cancelled and the soonest they could rebook us was 2 days later! Good news is they upgraded us to First Class, but the delay meant we had to shift some things around at home/work.

Christkindlmarket/Downtown

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One of the must attend events in Chicago during Christmas time is the Christkindlmarket. This was one of our first stops during the week to ensure we could go with limited crowds.

Our first stop was to get warm glühwein wine in their early mug design, which is one of Nathan’s favorites (if you couldn’t tell 😉 ).

I happily stuck to warm apple cider and hot chocolate, which they also do a wonderful job.

We wandered around for a while, freezing, but enjoying all the booths and crafts on display.

Thanks to TikTok, I had found another recommendation to stop by the Baked Cheese Haus and get a Raclette. Surprisingly, this is not a booth we had previously seen, so it was a must-have for this trip. It was tucked off to the side, so very easy to miss, but we found our way over.

First thing we noticed, was a not so great smell. I honestly couldn’t tell you why it smelled bad after getting one, but it was worth it. We got a “plain” one with just bread and cheese, and it was delicious!

After another loop, and more glühwein, we moved onto the rest of downtown. Granted, we were freezing cold at this point, so we stopped by Garrett’s for popcorn snacks and then into a mall to warm up.

Across the street was Macy’s, so we stopped by to see the window displays and any inside decorations. While not a lot inside, we did get to see the Tiffany ceiling, which is always beautiful.

Last up was to walk over to the Merchandise Mart, since they do a display inside and out. Sadly, we were freezing cold at this point, so we made it close enough to see the outside and decided that was good enough, and we made our way back to the Blue line on the L to head back to the car.

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Illumination: Tree Lights at Morton Arboretum

Later in the week, our next holiday event was out at the Morton Arboretum, one of our favorite outdoor locations in Chicago. They had a lights display throughout the park, with drink stations setup throughout.

We had learned our lesson from the Christkindlmarket and stopped by REI for some warmer clothes. So suited up in new boots, warm socks, and new base layers, we were much warmer on this outing.

The park was beautiful, and took us about an hour or so to walk through and enjoy all the different displays.