Fall Color Weekend- Cabin- Part II

After leaving Duluth we headed up to the cabin we were staying in for the weekend.  I'm not sure what city it's technically in but it's out of the city of Duluth but not quite to Two Harbors.  We stayed at Dodge's Log Lodges in the Evergreen cabin right on Lake Superior.  We had been there one time before for one night but it was in the dead of winter for my 29th birthday.  The cabins took new ownership last year and they've made some nice improvements.

We hung inside the cabin on Friday night, made dinner, lit a fire in the fireplace and drank wine while listening to music.

We woke early on Saturday morning so we could see the sun rise.  There were some clouds in the sky but the horizon was clear except for the exact area the sun was rising from.  It was still beautiful to sit out on the deck and on the rocks on the shore and see the beautiful colors all the while it was definitely below 40 degrees.

Me on the deck waiting for the sun to rise

Steam on the lake

Two surfers

Unfortunately, M's good friend's mom passed away last week and the funeral was on Saturday morning in Webster, Wisconsin.  M drove down to Webster to attend the funeral and then came back close to 3 pm.  While it wasn't a perfect situation for our weekend, it worked out just fine and allowed me to have some alone time at the cabin since I didn't have a car to go anywhere.  I cleaned, read, watched the news, basked in the sun, took a nap and just enjoyed the day.

On Saturday night, we had a fire outside on shore and spent over two hours out there talking and looking at the stars. It was chilly at 36 degrees but we bundled up and cuddled in a big comforter. Between the two of us we saw 10 shooting stars.  It has been so long since I had seen one but I saw 7 of them and every time it was so exciting and fascinating to me.  Some were bright and short and some were dim but had a long trail.  With the help of the Google Sky app on my phone, we located Jupiter which was shining so bright that it cast a reflection on the lake.  

We came inside, lit a fire, drank wine and listened to music again until falling asleep on the couch and then waking up in the middle of the night to go to the actual bed.  We woke up early and left the cabin by 9:15 am on Sunday morning.  

One last part to this story and that is the actual leaves!  Until next time. 

Fall Color Weekend- Duluth- Part I

This is the second year in a row that M and I will not be going on our annual-Vikings-game-on-the-road-trip, which is probably a good thing based on how *great* the Vikings are playing right now. That's a record of  0-4 for those of you that don't pay attention.  But, we felt like we had to at least take a mini-trip somewhere and what better place than on the North Shore in the fall when the leaves are at their peak.

We left Friday morning around 8:15 am and headed up to Duluth first to Spirit Mountain to go on the Timber Flyer Zip Line and the Timber Twister Alpine Coaster.  The zip line was way different than what I thought it would be.  I thought I'd be strapped in and essentially hanging from the top of a line and swinging my way down.  It was actually a seat you get strapped in and M and I could go together.  We went down 700 feet and then you come back up again backwards.  Not scary at all and barely thrilling but it was a pretty view.

The Timber Twister was a lot more fun and a lot longer.  The whole ride probably took 5 minutes including the ride back up the hill.  We weren't allowed to take pictures while we were riding down but M snapped a few on the way back up the hill.  I'd recommend doing this if you're in the area.  If you look in the background of the first picture, I'm in the car behind M. 

We stopped at Grandma's for lunch and then to Canal Park for a few minutes before getting back on the road and heading a little further north where we'd spend the rest of our weekend.  I'll update you about that next time!

Just Me and Gramps

Last Wednesday night my Grandpa and I went out to dinner.  We went to\The Little Oven in St. Paul.  They've remodeled their tiny location and it looks nice in there.  The last time I was there was almost 7 years ago when M and I took my grandpa and gramma there for their 50th wedding anniversary present.  My grandpa's niece (my mom's cousin) works there one night a week and she happened to be our server for the night.  What's the perk of having a server you know?  Getting a tiny piece of tiramisu and a baby cannoli at the end of dinner. :)

My arm just isn't long enough for self portraits.

Burger Jones

M and I took the day off after our tailgating party and we really didn't accomplish much during the day other than going to eat and going to the grocery store.  We finally tried Burger Jones in the location by Lake Calhoun in Minneapolis after wanting to go there since they opened which I'm sure is 2+ years ago now. I remember going to this location when it was an Applebee's but after walking in there again, I was just surprised at how small it was.  I didn't go all out and get the White Trash burger which consists of a burger with chicken fried bacon, cheese curds and lots of Velveeta.  (Yuck!)  I just got a veggie burger but I did get some huge onion rings.   Have any of you ever been there?  What did you think?  If you haven't been there, is it some place you've wanted to go?  They were just voted best burger by Minneapolis/St. Paul Magazine.

Cherrie Jones Tailgate Party September 25, 2011

The 5th Annual Cherrie Jones Tailgate Party was a complete success last Sunday.  The weather was sunny and a little chilly in the morning but it warmed up to a beautiful 72 degrees by late afternoon.  We got out there at 8 am and people were arriving all the way through the 11 am hour.  By best estimates, we had around 115 people there, maybe even more and we even represented fans from each team in our division.  In honor of playing the Detroit Lions, it only seemed appropriate that we eat lion.  Yep, we cooked up some African Lion meat for everyone to try.  And yes, it's legal.  And no, it doesn't taste like chicken...more like a lower quality ground beef/steak of some sort.  Special thanks to M's niece Tiana and her husband Craig who were kind enough to donate tickets to one of the men's Gopher hockey games so we had a raffle for those to raise some money for liver cancer.  Special thanks to Greg Jones, Cherrie's husband who donated burgers and if you wanted one, a $1 donation was suggested.  M also sold some of the pins that were left over from previous Cherry Rides and in total of all income efforts, over $300 was raised.  We normally don't raise money for this party but just the Cherry Ride so it was awesome more money was raised. Special thanks to Chris Zenner who made a Cherry tailgate banner and special thanks to M's parents who attended their first tailgating experience. It was a surprise and M didn't know about it until they showed up at our house in the morning, despite M's dad shattering his heel earlier this week and having to be in a wheelchair.  We had a couple other special guests come out including Syd, AKA 100% Cheese Free, the Vikings mascot Viktor and even a pig was there! Most of us went into the game to watch the Lions beat the Vikings in overtime, 26-23, which turned out to the first loss for the Vikings against Detroit at home since 1997 and obviously the first loss for the tailgate party.  In fact, Detroit has never scored anything other than 10 points for the last 4 years.  Maybe it would have been better to have stayed outside the dome and party with a smaller group that watched the game outside with another special guest, former Vikings QB Tommy Kramer.  He hung out with about 15 of the people that stayed in the lot to watch the game on the TV they brought and ate and drank with them.

The game was secondary this day and all focus was on Cherrie and our efforts to celebrate her and her life.  Special thanks to my family peeps that came to the party!  Thank you Dennis, Pat, John, Jen, Troy, Tara, Chris and Laura!  ♥

There are tons of pictures that I took through the morning and here are just a couple but please take a look at the slideshow below that I created that has all of the pictures from the day.

I can't wait until next year's party and I hope you can join us.  Let's cross our fingers it's not a December game!

My family!

Check out the slideshow of the other photos from the day: