Filed under: Detroit Lakes
A golf course, a sheet of plastic, a ton of water. That’s all I’m going to say…
Filed under: Detroit Lakes
So apparently Detroit Lakes is on butterfly migration path to Mexico! And they all stop at Fair Hills. The place isn’t exactly inundated but it’s fun to see the monarchs and as you can see we saw at least one good branch-load of butterflies is a fir tree, which kind of surprised me. I thought they’d like a softer looking tree.
Filed under: Detroit Lakes
We’re in Fair Hills Resort this week. It’s up in Detroit Lakes. It’s like a Minnesota-flavored Dirty Dancing resort. There are loads of kids’ activities – and some adult stuff too. There’s a talent show and a show (Hootenanny) that features staff talent. There are 3 meals a day. The chef can make pancakes in any shape!
These were our activities from the first full day:
- 7 am – I walk with Barb, who leads about 20 people on a 1 hour walk around Big Pelican Lake. A boat picks us up in time for breakfast. Lily joined me. We saw an eagle
- 8:00 – breakfast
- Morning: It rained so the best activity was swimming. All of us swam for about 90 minutes in the pool and hot tub. It rained steadily the whole time – but it really was perfect for swimming!
- 11:00: Zumba – a new aerobics-dance exercise class, which the big girls and I loved!
- Noon – lunch
- 1:00: golf lesson for me, Kate & Lily
- 2:30: Aine got to ride a horse and play on the playground with other 4-8 year olds. Lily and Kate went for the water games – and they both jumped off the high dock-thing. Kate did not love it. I watched her on the high dock thinking about jumping – other kids trying to convince her, her thinking, getting close to the edge and backing off, but eventually she jumped
- 6:00: dinner
- 7:30: Ice cream social and volleyball game
- 10:00 everyone is asleep!
So that’s kind of a typical day. Rather than catalog every day like that I thought I’d just post highlight posts for the rest of the week – short but sweet. Maybe with some videos.
Filed under: St Paul
We’ve been easing back into life in St Paul. The girls have been seeing friends. I’ve been meeting with clients. Patrick is still writing.
We’ve been trying to keep an eye on what’s happening in our own home ground. Tuesday night we took a drive down to Stillwater – about 45 minutes away from St Paul on the St Croix River right across from Wisconsin.
Stillwater is a great town at nearly anytime – but Tuesday was special since they had a band playing, movie in the park planned and a farmers’ market happening. We didn’t stay long enough for the movie – but we enjoyed the music, food and walk along the river.
On Wednesday they had music and movie in the park at Groveland – our local park. So we could walk down. Enjoy hotdogs for dinner. The girls gulped down tons of free root beer. There were different carnival games and Kate took advantage of the free massages – several times.
Kate and Lily each had a friend over. We all stayed to see Madagascar in the park. It was a fun night!
Filed under: St Paul
So we came home just in time for the Irish Fair – on purpose. Patrick’s on the board of the Irish Fair and didn’t want to miss it.
Friday night we went to see the Dropkick Murphy’s. They were fun. They played more traditional songs than I had hoped – but that made sense given the crowd. I made it up to the front/side of the stage for a few songs.
I was very impressed with the security and the crowd surfers. The surfers were all eventually dumped on the “other side” of the security fence – but really not very close to the stage. The security folks just herded them away from the stage and back out to the crowd. It was a good way to handle it. The dancers didn’t mind, it wasn’t much hassle for security and kept everyone having a good time.
During the Fair we had the great fortune of entertaining Ruan O’Donnell (no relation) from University of Limmerick. Ruan gave two talks: one of Robert Emmet, Irish Patriot and one on the IRA from 1948-1968. Ruan was very interesting. He had talked to a whole host of people for his research and it was fun to hear the stories. With any luck we’ll see Ruan again in Ireland – or maybe he’ll come to visit us again in Minnesota.
The weather at the Fair was touch and go. The ground was like a bog – and regular readers will know that we know what a bog is like! Saturday night they had to close early for a tornado warning. Sunday the weather was beautiful.
We saw a cute play for kids, we played games, we watched bands and singers, we walked along the Mississippi, we saw lots of Irish dancers, we had a great time.
A weekend full of festival was a great way to break back into Minnesota.
Filed under: St Paul
Kinder Camp is the pre-kindergarten event at Nativity. It happens for 4 days. The pre-kinders get to go to school and check things out.
Aine went (in her hat of course). On her second day she “made up a friend”. I asked about any new friends on her third day but she patiently explained that she had her old friend (from day 2).
Aine is very ready for kindergarten.
Filed under: Minneapolis
The Bakken Museum is a “one of a kind museum exploring the mysteries of our electrical world.” We had never been there. It’s in a beautiful old house near the lakes in Minneapolis. They had a happy hour there and I decided it was OK to bring kids because they also had the Raptor Center there.
It’s very cool. There’s a super cool exhibit on Frankenstein – but it was a little too scary for Aine so I wasn’t able to hang there too much. We got to see a very early pacemaker and try some electrical experiments.
This weekend we met with our girl cousins in Madison. We stayed at a Holiday Inn with a small water park. All we did was swim and relax. We ate pizza on the pool deck. We tried some local beer and it was good. Of course Wisconsin knows beer. We watched TV at night.
Filed under: Minneapolis
In the Twin Cities there’s a great May Day tradition in and near Powderhorn Park. There’s a big parade with floats and stuff, then there’s a big production by the lake, and a festival. The theme this year was the environment and the people versus the big corporate bail outs. The weather was amazing.
Heart of the Beast puppet theater is responsible for much of the cool activities on May Day. People are welcome to come into HOB week leading up to the parade to help prepare the various floats and costumes. We don’t’ usually participate to that degree but we do enjoy seeing it all.
Filed under: Minneapolis
One of the nice things about our area in the summer is going to hang out at the Minnehaha Falls. There’s a fun restaurant called Sea Salt – and you can eat in the park. We went over Memorial weekend and had a really nice time. The Falls are pretty weak this year – a sign that we need rain desperately. The Falls should still be pretty impressive at this time of year.
We climbed all around the Creek. They are actually working on it – and it’s going to be nice. They are building up the ad hoc swimming area, which is fun but has always been pretty muddy. We actually walked from the Creek around to the shores of the Mississippi. We could see the big dam.
Next time we go we’re going to get there early enough to rent a bicycle build for 4!
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