Filed under: St Paul
We were kind of the rerun family this month; we also went to the History Center twice this month. We hadn’t been there is years. Aine was still in God’s pocket last time we were there. But I have to say, the History Center was fun – a ton cooler than I remembered or maybe the kids are just at better ages to enjoy it now. (In other words, maybe we’re cooler now.) I’ll just tell you about our favorite parts…
The tornado room
There’s an exhibit on weather – big shock for Minnesota. But there’s a cool reenactment of the 1965 tornado in Fridley. None of us were around for the 1965 tornado, but we’re all experienced tornado watches so we knew a little bit. But this exhibit gives you a much better sense of having been there. It’s in a space that looks like a basement. You turn on the radio and you start to hear the radio report from the day of the tornado,. You can see the sky changing color out the basement window. You here that it’s coming. The hear and see the hail and then the yellowish quiet before you hear the loud noise like a train going overhead – then you see a tree fall down out the window. It’s pretty scary – in a good way.
Fighter Plane
The next exhibit is cool in a sad way. You climb into an old fighter plane as if you’re a new recruit on the way to Normandy or someplace like that. The exhibit doesn’t have a super high tech feel but you do get the sense that you’re taking off and flying through a little vibrating, the noise and the change in the clouds out the window. They talk through the history of the time by talking to you as If you were a soldier. Talking about how so many of the soldier would have been sick on the plane – too many to all reach the sick bucket. They give some context for why you’re going over in the plane – and then you’re hit and the plane starts to spiral down. Only 3 make it out alive. As I said – it’s sad. Even poor Aine left saying – so we died then, huh? But I feel like if you’re country is in a war that maybe you ought to get what that means no matter how old you are.
It’s part of the Greatest Generation exhibit. We were with Grandma, but she isn’t from the Greater Generation but the others who were there at the same time were a little older. It was kind of interesting to be there with folks who might have remembered some of it. Grandma did remember other parts of the exhibit – in fact I remembered some of the plates and other items because my Grandma Murphy would have had all of it still when I was a kid.
The House
Finally there’s a house replica and the historians have tracked the owners of the home since it was built. It’s from the East Side, which is an areas that we don’t really know – but it’s fun to walk through the rooms and learn about the inhabitants. You see how it went from what seemed like a pretty fancy place to becoming a duplex and what that meant for the new inhabitants. You get a sense as you read the info from the families that the neighborhood was super friendly at one point but that it became less so – maybe because everywhere just became less friendly, maybe as new immigrants moved in from new areas, maybe as the house got older and older and probably fell into needing more repairs.
They have a class at the History Center where you can research the history of your own house. Maybe I’ll do that with the kids when we get back this summer.
Filed under: Minneapolis
We’ve had two fun visits to The Walker in November. First we went to the Dan Graham show on the first Saturday, which is always a good kid’s day. Sadly we missed the Suicide Commandoes because I went to a conference with the Twin City Media Alliance. The conference was good – but the Suicide Commandoes would have been good too.
Back to what we did do – Dan Graham is very modern art. He uses plastics, perspectives and a video from Minor Threat circa 1983; sadly not filmed in the Twin Cities, but still fun to watch. Actually one work I really liked was installed in a small room; on one walk you could see a video of someone rolling down the hill holding a video camera; on the other wall you could see what was being videotaped.
Despite the fact that it was November in Minnesota, it was also a great day to visit the sculpture garden. So we walked around there too.
A couple of weeks later, Patrick and I went back for the After Hours show – where they gave a sneak preview of the benches and binoculars exhibit. Even Patrick liked the new exhibit, which was really lots of classic Walker pieces all posted in one very tall room. It included the Chuck Close face, which I think is the most classically Walker piece ever. Except of course for the talking dolphin, which they are taking down. That’s the family favorite exhibit. In fact I’ve started a “Dave the Dolphin” Facebook group you can join if you too love the Dolphin. I read where they were talking it down mid-December – but someone at the museum said February.
Anyways the After Hours was a lot of fun – great people watching. We saw a fun band. I tried a new cocktail, which really reminded me that I’m a beer girl.
Filed under: St Paul
Well, we got our use out of our costumes this year. Lily was a flapper, Kate was Dorothy and Aine was Super Girl. We did well by checking out Good Will early – like 6 weeks early. The Good Will is still the best place to find costumes.
We started the festivities by going to the Zoo Boo at Como Zoo. We had never been. It’s a fundraiser for the zoo. You walk around and collect candy. It was fun. I was surprised that they didn’t incorporate the animals more. Not that I thought they should dress up the elephant as a globe or anything but I was hoping to see the animals at rest. Maybe they decided they wouldn’t pay them the overtime. Aine was a good age for the zoo; the other girls were a little old. But we had fun. I nearly forgot the best part – the girls rode the carousel too. That is fun at night.
Collecting candy in Edina. The Saturday before Halloween was beautiful – too beautiful to sit and work all day. I checked out the various outdoor events and we decided to go to the trick or treating at 50th and France. No we’re not from the area. Yes we were interlopers but it was fun. The kids ate free at Tejas, which is a restaurant I like and rarely visit. Kate won a banana bread, because she is the luckiest little thing in the world. We got tons of candy.
Boo Bash on Grand. This one was close to home. We walked from our house to Dixie’s on Grand Avenue and back collecting candy, face painting, tattoos and more. (I’m going to say that’s at least a 3 mile walk.) The girls were able to get a pair of sunglasses or bracelet from Lillian’s. It was a fun but tiring day!
Highland trick or treat – Halloween day we trekked around Highland for more treats. Mostly we had to do some shopping but we figured we were getting so good at it we might as well join the trick or treaters here too. The kids got to eat at the Highland Grill for free – that’s always fun.
Halloween was last night. We are finally and officially finished with trick or treating. Aine got 54 pieces of candy. Kate got 124. Lily spent the night at Chloe’s so she’ll have to check in with her haul later.
Filed under: Minneapolis
Earlier this week Patrick and I were invited to a brand new restaurant – Cooper. It’s one of Kieran’s restaurants and he invited us to a sneak preview.
The décor is pretty spectacular. Apparently most of it came from Ireland. Kieran said it’s meant to be like an Irish manor house and it is. The food was very good. The artichoke dip was a little spicy for me – but I’m pretty wimpy. I had the walleye sandwich and it was good. The French fries were excellent – though I was very strong and didn’t have too many. Which was good since then I had room for dessert. They had sneak peeks of apple crumble and some kind of chocolate molten cake – which was super, super yummy.
St Louis Park is pretty far for us to drive – but it was worth it.
Over the weekend the girls and I went to Nelson’s pumpkin patch in Litchfield. It’s our second annual trip. We love it.
Grandpa and I love the pumpkin chucker flinger thinger – a trebuchet they use to catapult pumpkins into the lake. I have included 2 video because it’s so much fun to watch.
The girls loved the baby kittens and the carts. We have a picture of the carts; they are kind of like soapbox cars. You ride them down the hill. They were fun.
We took a hay ride aroudn the fields. The girls got to swing in the hayloft, which looked like fun too. They fed animals, had hippity hop races, climed up hay stacks, participated in the farm olympics and more. It’s treally kind of amazing how many very simple thing they have at the farm and how much fun a kid can have. We thought we’d be there for 2 hours; we were there for 4.
On the way home we popped in to see the world’s largest ball of twine and the the girls’ greatgrandparents’ grave in Darwin.
Filed under: Minneapolis
We spent our morning at the Bakken Museum. The girls learned about circuits as part of the Bakken Museum super science Saturday. It’s always fun. Aine is still too scared to hang out in the Frankenstein room. We learned that Earl Bakken (inventor of the pacemaker) is lives in Hawaii.
After the Bakken we headed to the Second Annual Ground Breaker Battle – a break dancing contest. We went last year too. I think the dancing is just amazing! But this year it was the impromptu singing that blew me away.
The emcee was sort of killing time when someone started beatboxing and then they looked for a singer and suddenly we’re on the set for Fame. We were kind of like the nerdy extras who can’t really sing or dance but maybe could write haikus if necessary.
At night Patrick and I went to the Guthrie. We had an amazing meal and saw The Importance of Being Earnest. It was good but I bet it’s better if you haven’t read or seen it a hundred times.
Filed under: Minneapolis
So on Friday night I went to see Ron Paul and Michele Bachmann at the Northrup. I thought there would be a ton of people there – but there weren’t really. The audience didn’t fill the main floor at the Northrup. The crowd was divided into at least three camps. There were the Paulites, the protestors and the Bachmann fans.
Somehow Kathleen and I scored second row seats. My only disappointment was that Billy couldn’t be with us. I think the folks ahead of us were Bachmann supporters. So I tried to avoid them. It was funny to watch them sort of argue about who would sit where – in the best seat in the house. Behind us were some Ron Paulers. Otherwise the rest of us in that little area were kind of nondescript. The protestors were all on one side – and were focused on health care. Well there were other comments in the audience but that one group of placard-carrying protestors.
It was interesting to hear the speakers. I have to give them props for starting on time and really most folks were pretty quick. They knew that the crowd wanted to see Ron Paul. Even Michele Bachmann wasn’t as long as she could have been. I’m going to try to not say anything about her since I’m working with the girls on the credo – if you can’t say anything nice, say nothing. I’ve got a lot of nothing to say about Bachmann. (Except that maybe someone who is her friend should clue her into the fact that the Soviet Union is no longer.)
I got a little bit of Ron Paul on video – and then my Flip ran out of batteries. I don’t agree with him on all of the issues – but I have room for a lot of what he has to say. He advocated: bringing the troops home (all of them), adding transparency to the federal reserve bank and others, living and let live and speaking out when you disagree with the government. It was funny to see Bachmann applaud some of his point that you know she just doesn’t believe. I went in part to see how they would handle those differences. Ron Paul spoke as he always would and she clapped.
One of the historical aspects of the day vis-a-vis Ron Paul is that Congress started to look at his bill (HR1207), the Federal Reserve Transparency Act on Friday. So that came up a lot too.
The event lasted almost two hours. Afterward I got to shake Ron Paul’s hand. Again I was so sad that Billy wasn’t with me.
Filed under: St Paul
Last weekend was the very big fundraiser for the girls’ school. It’s a very big to do. On Monday I realized that we probably spent 18 hours up at the Fair. There were a ton of fun rides. Kate went on the Zipper!! Aine loved the obstacle course and the bouncy castle.
Lily had a slumber party after the Fair on Friday night. The good news is that we can’t hear a slumber party in the basement when we are upstairs. The other good news was that Lily let Kate hang with her friends too.
By the time Sunday rolled around we were happy to hover around the bingo and Twinkie walk events, which was good since our money had really run out the night before.
Filed under: St Paul
Aine and I made it to the Concrete and Grass concert – at least for a short time this weekend. We met Uncle Billy at Barrio for lunch. We liked that restaurant! We especially liked the wrestler masks and the overflowing candelabra.
After lunch Billy had to run to work – but Aine and I hung out and saw Idle Hands. I liked them. Aine liked the stream she could climb on in Mears Park.
Filed under: Minneapolis
I have a new favorite pastime – buying mystery art for $99.
The Soap Factory, an art gallery in Minneapolis, has a fundraiser where you can buy any work of art for $99. The art is all the same size – about 5×7 inches. It’s not framed and it’s not signed. Some is worth more than $99; some is not. You don’t find out who the artist is until you buy the work.
I went with Anita, who is always a good sport and I bought 2 works. One was by Lindsay Roth, a painter from Inver Grove Heights. Her piece reminded me of the exhibit we saw in IMMA in Dublin. The other was by Katherine Rochester, a program manager from the Gallery. I just liked that one.
The next day when I went to pick up the art, I let Aine pick out a work too. She picked work my Liz Miller, who I feel is the most established of the artists we selected. Maybe Aine has a calling.
Luckily this is not an ongoing event or I would own it all. I loved going through the art and trying to decide were possibly valuable. Also I like the idea that you pick what you like – not what’s valuable to someone else. Also I like that you just get the artists name so then if you’re not so knowledgeable in local art you have to go home and stalk the person.
My plan is to frame everything and put them in the dining room. I might get the girls to do works that are the same size and frame them too. Then guests can guess which are ours and which are gallery pieces. Regardless I will definitely be going to the next arty crap shoot!
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