I never really spent time here until a few weeks ago, even though we go hiking at Ryerson Woods…read morepretty regularly. It's a cute building with rotating exhibits and they also have scheduled and open crafting hours. My sister and I participated in a wreath making create and sip last night which was so fun and extremely reasonable at $20/per person when they supply the materials. Since their supplies are donated, it was really interesting to see all the different styles of wreaths that were made. We would definitely come back for another craft and sip.

I never knew this place existed until my neighbor told me about Ryerson Woods a few weeks ago and…read moresuggested I go because it was peak autumn. She told me there is a gallery, too. I made it up just in time before they closed for the day. It's a cute building and they have various collaborations. The first time I went their featured art was from the Highland Park Art Center. This past weekend I went back for their Soundscapes exhibit, which is a partnership with various non-profits and focused on art made by veterans and their families. I went to the opening reception, which was free, and included performances/spotlights on the participating partner organizations and some of the artists featured. It was a moving event (especially being Veteran's Day weekend) and a powerful exhibit. This is a great space and I loved learning more about how they support the local community and partner with other non-profits to bring art to the space and make art accessible. Highly recommend. Also, the surrounding area is stunning, so being able to see art and enjoy nature is a double dose of joy.

Wow, this was really terrible. It took 28 minutes to get from the entrance on Willow Road to the…read morebooth where you get your ticket scanned. Along that entire route are just lighted fake Christmas trees, and I was wondering if that was what we paid $40 for. You can tune your dial to 89.1 to hear some Christmas music as you drive through the place. Once you get path the ticket booth there are some more elaborate displays but they are gaudy as all get out. There was a whole weird "patriotic"-maybe MAGA-definitely weird section with a lighted Mt. Rushmore, tank shooting at a Christmas tree, Uncle Sam, Iwo Jima, a helicopter... the standard Christmas military presence I guess? Also odd is Dino World. You know how St. Nick spent Christmas with the dinosaurs and then during the ice age he just chilled (pun intended) with the elves and reindeer until modern day. And there's also the homage to winter construction with the construction cones, backhoes, and so on. The more typical winter and holiday scenes are there, but a very small fraction of the various scenes. Once we got past the ticket booth, it took us about 30 minutes to drive through. It went slow, and it was not an enjoyable ride for my 17 month old though she may have enjoyed it more if she was older. The only--and I mean ONLY--reason to subject yourself to this is if you need to visit a drive-through light display because one in the party is disabled or something. And even if that's the case, you could find some neighborhoods in the city and suburbs to drive through and probably see nicer displays and spend the $40 (plus tax) on dinner or something.

I was intrigued a few weeks ago when I saw lights atop a hill on Willow Road. It is the Third…read moreAnnual Willow Hill Lights Drive‑Thru Holiday Event!. Held at Willow Hill Golf Course, it is a 2.5 mile route with over one million lights, three drive through tunnels and a 30 foot Christmas tree. I have been to Lightscapes several times as well as Illuminations. This isn't quite that calibre of sophistication, but for $40 a car you can load up your car, wear your pjs, and drive-thru with the radio tuned to 89.9. I should have packed my car with pals but this wasn't bad. In fact, children might even prefer this. There are dinosaurs, trucks and cars, penguins and snowmen, The 12 days of Christmas, and more. It took about 25 minutes to drive through and we had timed entry at 5pm.

This is the only wood burning location that I have heard of. I like that Tipsy Paint has this…read moreunique offering. They also have paint nights and other types of classes. I signed up for one design but they are very flexible on what designs you do when you are there, you just have to use the board you signed up for. They also have lazy Susan classes. I saw that they previously did a Chicago bears logo class so I asked to do that and they printed me the picture to trace. The class was 3 hours and it took us the whole time. You have to be patient when wood burning. I really liked my final art! We were provided with instructions on how to take care of it and washing instructions so we can use it with food. I like that it is BYOB! The owner, Krystina, led our class. She was so friendly, patient, and provided great instructions. I'm addicted to wood burning! I will definitely be back!

Our time and experience here was so fun!! A great way to brush up on your artistic skills. Our…read moreteacher was awesome and very easy to follow

Still a great place. The outdoor patio is totally a postcard view of the sunset. its actually an…read moreamazing evening with a blue stone patio, to watch the sunset over the golf course. Flip side, the locker room is a touch old..but its an old club. The course is a great challenge and very well taken care of. Caddies are great as well and very knowledgeable of the course. Loses 1 star because the locker room is a tad dated.

Played a paddle tennis match there on Saturday and Sunday the place is beautiful the people are…read morevery friendly ,the food was delicious . I would highly recommend going if you have a chance. Thank you to all the staff from the ATPA for a great tournament location.

Art festival that is not overly crowded so you can actually enjoy yourself and see mall the amazing…read moreartwork. There's all types of art to admire. Glen or is a suburb that's very nice and safe and to enjoy it in a beautiful day makes it better. There's street parking around the festival for easy access to downtown Glencoe and if you don't drive there is a Metra station so you can sit back and relax on the way here without driving.

I wasn't aware this place existed, as it's a bit out of my usual distance for going to events. But…read moreI saw an instagram ad for Michael Cavanaugh and couldn't pass up the opportunity to see him (Movin' Out is one of my favorite Broadway shows). The location is very convenient to the Metra, and there's free parking in the lot for the building, which is always appreciated. The venue itself is nice -- intimate and a community-based feeling (there was a community band of some sort rehearsing in a room outside the theater when I left, which is charming). The theater itself isn't elaborate, but it's a nice space. It's great for this type of event. The show itself was great -- he's a fantastic performer, and I loved the set list and how interactive he tried to be with the audience (more on that later). I also loved that I was able to get a discounted seat because I bought a single seat in between seats that had already sold, so it was half price. (I don't know if they always do this, or if it was just because there were still quite a few seats left at the time I bought my ticket 2 weeks beforehand. Regardless, my frugal self appreciated it. I wish more places did that.). There were a few times during the show that the house lights randomly came on during a song, and it didn't seem like it was intentional. Maybe it was the light board operator hitting the wrong thing, or maybe a house manager bumped a switch. It was a little odd though and it happened a few times, which kind of took me out of the performance and made me think something was going on. But oh man, the crowd itself was an interesting experience from a people-watching perspective. It must be a Lake Forest thing? 96% of the audience seemed to think they were in the waiting room of a dentist office waiting for a root canal, and about 1% of the audience thought they were at Coachella (including the three 55-65 year old women next to me, who I'm pretty sure were drinking vodka out of a water bottle because they were getting progressively more wasted during the show despite only drinking from a clear water bottle lol. No judgement. We've all been there...I just haven't been there since I was 21 and trying to sneak my own alcohol into a street festival because I was cheap and not going to pay for overpriced drinks. But hey, you do you. YOLO!). The other 3% were like myself and wanted to get into it, but because everyone else seemed like they were afraid to move, we were holding back (because we didn't want to be "those people", like the ladies next to me...although honestly they seemed like they had a GREAT time, by the way they were grooving and had their hands up in the air even though not another soul in the theater did lol. I can only hope I'm that carefree when I grow up. I'm certainly not at this stage in my life). I almost feel bad for Michael, because I assume he wanted the audience to be a bit more into it than they were. He asked people to clap along a few times and he would start it and then as soon as he put his hands back on the piano to play, people stopped clapping (then he would start clapping again to try to get people going, and they would until he went back to playing. My dudes....he wanted you to clap along to the beat during the song. That's literally how that song works). I tried to keep it going but it was awkward (and bless the people next to me...they tried to clap but the alcohol was definitely impacting their ability to find and stay on the beat. I was fighting a losing battle trying to guide them haha). Also, the crowd here could stand to learn a few things about technology to avoid annoying everyone around them. Obviously people are going to take videos and photos, which is fine. I did too. But it seems like no one knew to turn down their screen brightness in a dark theater so you don't blind the people around you. It was super distracting and headache-inducing to see super bright phone screens out of the corner of my eye every few minutes (maybe it was just the section where I was seated). It would be nice if the ushers or house manager could've said something to folks or reminded people at the beginning not to let their phones be distractions. I was a house manager out in the western suburbs for a similarly sized theater while I was in grad school, and I worked at a theater that held concerts like this in high school, so I've worked at (and attended) hundreds of concerts just like this. This was definitely the strangest experience of an audience I've ever encountered. Apparently this is par for the course, though, because I made an IG story post describing my people observations during intermission and my friend asked me if I was at Gorton Center...I asked her how she knew and she said it was because of the audience description I gave lol. I'd go back and I'm glad I went. I'd just need to prepare myself so I'm not so jarred by the bizarre audience vibes.

Great community center! I had an office here for about 10 years and ran a non profit and watched…read morethe center grow from well appointed but not fully utilized community center into a bustling hub of classes, shows, private events, parties for the town. Rents are reasonable for private events. Shows are very reasonably priced. Classes are well attended.

We love going to Art at the Glen in Glenview!  It's a free art fair along Tower Drive at the Glen…read morein Glenview.  It is always a pleasure to leisurely looking at (and looking for) the artwork in so many categories!  The fair is a good size, there are more than 140 artists in the 2-day event this year on July 29 and 30.  There is also the "Kids Art Stop" this year, that encourages kids to participate in art.  We also enjoy looking at the dogs that come with their humans to the art fair, and sometimes get to socialize with them!   Other than food in the art fair, there are many local restaurants and eateries at the Glen to enjoy before and after the fair as well! There are plenty of free parking along the streets and parking lots that offer free parking to fair-goers are very close by.

I haven't been to Nickel City since the remodel, so I was curious to see what it looked like…read more The gentleman behind the desk was as kind as I remembered, and let me know what the options to put on the game cards were. He even let me turn in all of my "vintage" coupons that I had stashed away in the car--there was about 2,500 worth and he added them to my card, no questions asked! The space is very open and more quiet than other arcades. We were there on a Saturday night from about 6p-9:45p. $25/per person went a pretty long way! We played air hockey, the Simpsons, discovered some cool import games, tried our luck at the egg game, etc. I believe most of our party of 4 has credits left over. They still have the gear game that I remembered, the game where you have to drop the red balls into the buckets, etc., but I was pleasantly surprised to see they had a cool, new Hot Wheels puck game, a huge Monopoly spinner, and the Rick and Morty drop game that entertained me for the majority of my time there. I have a hard time parting with my tickets (clearly, based on the stash in my car), but the "store" had a wide variety of items and fair prices. We ate dinner before heading over so I cannot speak on the cafe nor did I use the bathroom myself. There are not as many games as other arcades, but it is a very nice place to spend some time!

This place sure has been cleaned up! It's been a while since I've been to Nickel City, so I'm not…read moresure when they renovated, but it's great now! The place seems to have more emphasis on carnival-type games where you get tickets as a result of playing them, such as skee-ball, basketball, ball bucket drop, etc. They do still have the nickel arcades, but definitely it is the minority. They also reconfigured the layout, and it feels more spacious and less clutter. All, surprisingly, all games were working and there was not a single out-of-order sign when I went. Sadly, there is no more free arcade section, except for a Tetris arcade near the basketball machine. While the arcades do take the good ol' fashioned Jefferson, all other games require a game card. Load up the game card at two different kiosk, one near the counter selling overpriced prizes, or one in the back near the bathrooms. Overall experience, I like it! With just spending $11, my teenager was able to entertain himself for close to 2-hrs. That's a great price for me. This cheap parent will come back. BATHROOM REVIEW: Located near the back, the bathrooms are the only thing that appears to not be renovated. Everything was in working order, and got the job done. Don't forget to wash your hands, because we all know you'll be touching everything afterwards. Sit or squat? Squat.