I flew out to Minneapolis on Thursday, Oct. 14th to visit with some great friends in this great city. Jerri and Zoe picked me up at the airport in the afternoon and after dropping off my bags at their beautiful home, we went for a nice walk around their neighborhood. We went to a rose garden where Zoe was quite interested in the water in the fountain. She had picked up a stick that she was pretending was her pet dog, and that "dog" wanted to go for a swim. She's quite the creative little person.
We also walked through a peace garden with a beautiful Japanese bridge and along the lake. We got to have some good time for chatting and catching up and when we were back in the neighborhood we stopped at a patisserie to pick up a sweet treat and some bread to have with dinner when Mark got home. Zoe really liked looking at all of the pastries that were right at her eye level:
On Friday morning Zoe and I decorated a little postcard for Mac that I wanted to try and get to NJ before I returned (and it worked!). Here it is clipped to the mailbox with a cute little birdy clothespin:
On Friday we had another adventure exploring the Linden Hills area of Minneapolis. Jerri and Zoe showed me one of their favorite public libraries, complete with a kids room with this cool magnet board. Zoe is really good at picking out "Z for Zoe!":
Also in this neighborhood we went to a wonderful children's bookstore called
Wild Rumpus. And the name lived up to the store. Zoe went through the kid-sized door that's built into the regular-sized door and instantly yelled, "Kitty!". She really loves animals and was so excited to see all of the ones in the store.
I'll admit, it's nothing out of the ordinary to have a cat in a bookstore, but several free-roaming cats and chickens along with other animals in cages and terrariums, including chinchillas, tarantulas, doves, mice and lizards makes this bookstore unique. Here is Zoe petting one of the chickens with another young customer.
After a wonderful Italian lunch, we found our way to a great antique/vintage store called Hunt and Gather. It was full to the brim with so much interesting stuff on two floors, but I was especially smitten with all of the piles of letters. I took a bunch of photos, here's just one:
After finding our way home we met up with Mark again at the house and put a wonderful dinner together. Jerri and Mark always make great food and it's so nice to sit around the table and catch up. Our good friend from college, Joey, also lives in Minneapolis and he joined us later for some dinner and then Pie Happy Hour! A restaurant around the corner from Jerri and Mark has the wonderful concept of a Pie Happy Hour where each slice of pie is only $1. So Joey and I went and picked out some good slices. I had banana cream, which was outstanding. We also got some gigantic cookies for only 97 cents each. It was the perfect dessert to have while playing Bananagrams and enjoying the evening.
On Saturday morning, Mark took Zoe to swim class and Jerri and Trinity and I went out to brunch at a great little place called
Butter. The food was good, and the company was even better. I met Trinity (and her husband Paul) through Jerri and Mark when we were living in Chicago, and they also lived in Boston while I was living there so we got to become good friends there. They moved to Minneapolis around the same time I moved to Princeton, so getting to see them is quite a treat! Here are me, Trinity and Jerri (and Zoe) on Jerri and Mark's front porch after brunch:
After brunch Mark, Jerri and Zoe and I headed to Theodore Wirth park to enjoy a walk through the Eloise Butler Wildflower Garden. It has a neat little trail around the garden and a book that you can take with you to help identify some of the plants. Zoe really liked holding onto the book. Here are Jerri, Zoe and Mark looking a little chipmunk among the logs:
Toward the end of our walk, we paused to take some photos and Zoe started doing this cute thing where she would run from Jerri to Mark (who would give her a little flip) and then to me, giving each of us big hugs. She just kept on doing this and we were all laughing pretty hard. It was just too fun, but she eventually got tired from all the running, flipping and hugging.
Here she is giving me a big hug!
Saturday night we all (including Joey) went to dinner at Paul and Trinity's house. We brought some good appetizers and beer and Trinity and Paul made a wonderful vegetarian Orzo dish and roasted Brussels Sprouts for the main course. It was a wonderful evening full of chatting and eating and a grand tour of their house and gardens. It was great to see where they're living now.
And while we were in the garden I spotted this monster zucchini! Trinity is quite the gardener!
It was great to see Paul and Trinity (and all of their pets) in their home. We ended the night with a fire in their fire pit in their backyard, which was a perfect way to end another beautiful fall day in Minneapolis.
More photos and blogging about the rest of my trip coming soon!
I flew out to Minneapolis on Thursday, Oct. 14th to visit with some great friends in this great city. Jerri and Zoe picked me up at the airport in the afternoon and after dropping off my bags at their beautiful home, we went for a nice walk around their neighborhood. We went to a rose garden where Zoe was quite interested in the water in the fountain. She had picked up a stick that she was pretending was her pet dog, and that "dog" wanted to go for a swim. She's quite the creative little person.
We also walked through a peace garden with a beautiful Japanese bridge and along the lake. We got to have some good time for chatting and catching up and when we were back in the neighborhood we stopped at a patisserie to pick up a sweet treat and some bread to have with dinner when Mark got home. Zoe really liked looking at all of the pastries that were right at her eye level:
On Friday morning Zoe and I decorated a little postcard for Mac that I wanted to try and get to NJ before I returned (and it worked!). Here it is clipped to the mailbox with a cute little birdy clothespin:
On Friday we had another adventure exploring the Linden Hills area of Minneapolis. Jerri and Zoe showed me one of their favorite public libraries, complete with a kids room with this cool magnet board. Zoe is really good at picking out "Z for Zoe!":
Also in this neighborhood we went to a wonderful children's bookstore called Wild Rumpus. And the name lived up to the store. Zoe went through the kid-sized door that's built into the regular-sized door and instantly yelled, "Kitty!". She really loves animals and was so excited to see all of the ones in the store.
I'll admit, it's nothing out of the ordinary to have a cat in a bookstore, but several free-roaming cats and chickens along with other animals in cages and terrariums, including chinchillas, tarantulas, doves, mice and lizards makes this bookstore unique. Here is Zoe petting one of the chickens with another young customer.
After a wonderful Italian lunch, we found our way to a great antique/vintage store called Hunt and Gather. It was full to the brim with so much interesting stuff on two floors, but I was especially smitten with all of the piles of letters. I took a bunch of photos, here's just one:
After finding our way home we met up with Mark again at the house and put a wonderful dinner together. Jerri and Mark always make great food and it's so nice to sit around the table and catch up. Our good friend from college, Joey, also lives in Minneapolis and he joined us later for some dinner and then Pie Happy Hour! A restaurant around the corner from Jerri and Mark has the wonderful concept of a Pie Happy Hour where each slice of pie is only $1. So Joey and I went and picked out some good slices. I had banana cream, which was outstanding. We also got some gigantic cookies for only 97 cents each. It was the perfect dessert to have while playing Bananagrams and enjoying the evening.
On Saturday morning, Mark took Zoe to swim class and Jerri and Trinity and I went out to brunch at a great little place called Butter. The food was good, and the company was even better. I met Trinity (and her husband Paul) through Jerri and Mark when we were living in Chicago, and they also lived in Boston while I was living there so we got to become good friends there. They moved to Minneapolis around the same time I moved to Princeton, so getting to see them is quite a treat! Here are me, Trinity and Jerri (and Zoe) on Jerri and Mark's front porch after brunch:
After brunch Mark, Jerri and Zoe and I headed to Theodore Wirth park to enjoy a walk through the Eloise Butler Wildflower Garden. It has a neat little trail around the garden and a book that you can take with you to help identify some of the plants. Zoe really liked holding onto the book. Here are Jerri, Zoe and Mark looking a little chipmunk among the logs:
Toward the end of our walk, we paused to take some photos and Zoe started doing this cute thing where she would run from Jerri to Mark (who would give her a little flip) and then to me, giving each of us big hugs. She just kept on doing this and we were all laughing pretty hard. It was just too fun, but she eventually got tired from all the running, flipping and hugging.
Here she is giving me a big hug!
Saturday night we all (including Joey) went to dinner at Paul and Trinity's house. We brought some good appetizers and beer and Trinity and Paul made a wonderful vegetarian Orzo dish and roasted Brussels Sprouts for the main course. It was a wonderful evening full of chatting and eating and a grand tour of their house and gardens. It was great to see where they're living now.
And while we were in the garden I spotted this monster zucchini! Trinity is quite the gardener!
It was great to see Paul and Trinity (and all of their pets) in their home. We ended the night with a fire in their fire pit in their backyard, which was a perfect way to end another beautiful fall day in Minneapolis.
More photos and blogging about the rest of my trip coming soon!
2 comments:
WOW! Great work on the blog, Beth! I was just about to start posting and ow you've put me to shame. I have to catch up, though. What a great post! I'm so happy you came! Miss you so much already! Can't wait to see you again soon!!!!
Yay! I was looking forward to these Mpls posts. It was so fun having you in town and spending time with you, d Joey and the Wagner gang. I hope you don't mind, but I am gonna steal a few of these photos for my blog. Looking forward to seeing you again in March.
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