Harriet Brewing Tour

M and I went to Harriet Brewing in Minneapolis for a brewery tour last Wednesday, which are free.  The brewery has only been open a year but is doing very well.  They have tours every Wednesday and you start out with some beer and admiring the original artwork of Jesse Brodd, who creates all the labels for the beer.  If I remember correctly from the tour, he is one of the investors of Harriet Brewing.  One of their brewers, Paul, gave us a tour which took 45 minutes or so as he explained the beer brewing process and the equipment.  The area they brew in is relatively small and also under construction but they have big dreams  there and it sounds like some of them will be coming to fruition very soon including a brewpub with a patio-type area that will serve their beer and food from the local restaurants that serve their beer.  Not quite sure about the details but that's supposed to happen sometime this spring.  If you just want to stop by and buy a growler on Saturdays, or check out the art, you can do so and then hang out in their lounge area and relax and listen to some music. If you are in the area of Lake and Minnehaha, check them out.    

All for Me!

Remember when I took the day off from work a couple of Fridays ago?  Well, I was able to meet my honey for lunch and then head to Rosedale for a little bit of shopping too.  I didn't have to spend any of my own money since I received some gift cards for my birthday and for Valentine's Day.  It was nice to pamper myself with some items that were free!

First to Sephora:

Then to Bath and Body Works:

And finally to Bare Escentuals:

Thank you M for all of this stuff!

Before I went to the mall, I stopped at Bed, Bath & Beyond and took the plunge!  I had been doing research off and on since October.  I really wanted a certain kitchen appliance and it was expensive but I used a $100 BB&B gift card I've been saving since August, a $75 gift card from my parents for my birthday, a $25 Visa gift card from winning Wellness Bingo at work, a 20% off BB&B coupon and roughly $167 out of my own pocket covered the cost of what I wanted.  The bummer was they don't carry what I wanted in-store and so I had to order it to be shipped which cost $25.  So I ordered it Friday and it arrived at my house last Thursday.  So what did I splurge on?

A blender!  Ok, I know, it's SUPER EXPENSIVE for a blender but I am totally excited about it.  My food life will improve because of it.  The possibilities with it seem endless and I can't wait to show off some of my creations I'll be making.  So far I've made strawberry "ice cream", a glowing green smoothie, blended some salsa and made another green smoothie with spinach, peaches, banana and almond milk this morning.  It's small and sleek compared to the Vitamix, which I had been making comparisons with but decided on the Blendtec and I'm completely happy.  Now I can't wait to make my own hummus, black bean dip, soups (the blender makes it hot for you!), flours, nut butters and everything else! 

If you have time and are interested, watch the Blendtec demos, part 1 and part 2.  I'm the type of person who likes infomercials so I dig this kind of stuff.  And if you've been to Costco, maybe you've seen this demo in person. 

Sunday Morning Brunch

Last Sunday, my friend Kristi picked me up and we headed to Maynard's in Rogers for brunch where Ang, Heather and Tanya awaited for our arrival.  We met in honor of Kristi's birthday, which was the weekend prior and she wanted to do a brunch instead of our dinner dates.

Only one of us had ever had Maynard's brunch before and it was pretty good.  There was a good selection of cold items as well as both breakfast food and otherwise.

It wasn't really convenient to get a picture of all of us as our server wasn't around and the lobby was packed so we just put the camera on the ground and took our picture, knowing this is the worst angle for double chin city.  Don't worry, we took one with double chins (well for me at least!) and the non-double chin version.

A New Design

It's hard for me to stay happy with a blog layout and it was one of my resolutions this year to change the layout of my blog.  Today, I've finally done that.  Not only have I changed the layout, I've changed my blog title.  My new blog name is January Baby, which obviously is more in line with my blog address.  When I first started blogging, I didn't know if I would stick with it and I didn't know much about it so I didn't put much thought into any of it.  Now, I'm glad to have gotten rid of the My Everyday Life, which is pretty generic, even though it completely describes my blog and the way I run it.

What do you think of the new layout?  Is there anything that I can do to make it easier to read or be organized for you guys?

February Birchbox and All the Other Alternatives

I received my February Birchbox in the mail around Valentine's Day.  Again, I'm disappointed with my goodies.  At this point, I feel like I'm only paying for the element of surprise in seeing what has arrived and it's only every few months that I really think the box was a good deal. 

However, I've done some research and there are plenty of these types of services that are popping up including:

Beauty Army

Cravebox

Julep Maven

GoGo Girlfriend

MyGlam

Beautyfix

Eco-Emi

I've already signed up for Beauty Army as you can choose the deluxe samples that come to you.  It's $12 a month instead of Birchbox's $10 but I'm picking out the things I want so it should be worth it.  

Cravebox looks like it's not just limited to makeup or beauty products but other stuff like pretty pens, chocolate and other goodies.  Not really what I'm looking for though.

Julep Maven sounds awesome but at $19.99 a month, it's expensive. It's all nail polish and nail products and you receive over $40 in products every month.  Sounds appealing but with the addiction that I'm trying to tame with Zoya right now (Ang, you have a little bit to do with this), I have to skip out on this one.  

MyGlam looks like a good service too but they're currently sold out of monthly subscriptions and based on what I read, it might be 4-5 months until they notify me that I can have a subscription.  We'll see what happens when that time comes.  

Beautyfix is quarterly and $50 but people seem to like it.

Eco-Emi looks fun to me as it's all eco-friendly products but at $15 a month, I can't splurge on this one too.  M, you can give me this one as a monthly subscription.  (I highly doubt he even read this far into my writing!  I think I lost him at the pictures or maybe even the title.)

Do any of these other subscription services sounds good to you or do you know of one that I haven't mentioned? 

Happy Birthday Grandma

So while I spent last Friday at the cemetery for the one year passing anniversary of my gramma as well as at the cemetery for Cherrie on Saturday, I also spent time Friday at the cemetery to say Happy Birthday to my other grandma.  My grandma passed away in July 2008 at age 95 and Sunday the 19th would have been her 99th birthday!  The part of the cemetery she is buried in was still a little snow covered and there was a slushy mess on all the headstones around her but my grandma's headstone was completely uncovered with snow, which I think the sun was hitting perfectly at her.  I did brush/scrape off the snow of my grandpa's headstone though. :) Happy Birthday Grandma!

Minnesota History Center: 1968 Exhibit

After we visited Cherrie and had lunch with M's family on Saturday, we went to the Minnesota History Center which is within walking distance of the cathedral.  It was such a beautiful, sunny, warm February day with no snow on the ground and we were able to hang outside without a jacket and be comfortable.

I had purchased a Groupon a while back for a one year household membership to the Minnesota Historical Society, which includes entrance into all of these places.

M and I had just been to the history center for Winterfest, however it looked way different this time around.  We visited a few of the exhibits but we went there to see the 1968 exhibit which closed on Monday.  And what do you get for waiting until the last weekend to see it?  A 30 minute wait to get into the exhibit as well as elbow-to-elbow treatment once you're in there, which actually made it difficult to enjoy and forced us to have to rush through it.

Instead of giving you a rundown of what exactly it was, I'll sum it up on pictures instead.  Some where taken with my phone and some were taken with the camera but all were taken quickly because of the people on top of us.

Other areas:

We may have stopped at Mojo Monkey Donuts also.  It's the second time we've been there in as many weeks.  Yum!

It was M that got the gigantic s'more donut

Happy Birthday Cherrie

We went to the cemetery late Saturday morning and met up with M's family to say happy birthday to Cherrie.  She would have been 53.  We released purple balloons again while saying happy birthday and then we all went to Jethro's for lunch.  As M said, Cherrie would be proud that they all come together for her.  

Yarusso's

Last Wednesday, my mom's side of the family got together for our quarterly Yarusso's dinner.  We were a little bit late doing it but my grandpa thought it would be good to do it during the week of the anniversary of my gramma's death.  We were missing a few but it's amazing how many of us can get together with just a couple of weeks notice.

My Two Valentines

I had two Valentines for V-Day...Michael and my grandpa.  (Dad, I didn't forget about you.  I wore the heart necklace you gave me when I was a kid.) We asked my grandpa if he wanted to join us on Valentine's Day for our traditional Valentine's dinner at White Castle.  It was the 5th time M and I have gone to White Castle for V-Day and our 8th together.  My grandpa didn't want to intrude on our dinner but we insisted he was not intruding at all.  We picked him up, gave him a homemade card, some chocolate and Jelly Belly jelly beans and we went to the Stillwater location, which is one that just opened in 2011.  

For those that don't know, you need reservations for White Castle on V-Day. They have a hostess, bring you to your candlelit table, have a server take your order and they even take your picture and put it on their website.  We sat at a high-top table right in the middle of the restaurant and we ordered a bunch of things for all of us to share including fish nibblers, mozz stix, chicken rings, onion chips, fries and we each ordered our own sandwich.  We even received a little cheesecake dessert but M and I gave ours to my grandpa to take home and eat later along with all the leftovers.  What surprised me most about the night was that I felt a hand on my shoulder so I looked over and it was my cousin John and his wife Jen!  It was so funny to see them there and after experiencing it one time, they plan to make it their V-Day tradition to go to White Castle!  John told me that his parents (my aunt and uncle) were there earlier in the evening too!  See, all the cool kids are doing it!  

I spoke to my grandpa on Wednesday night and he told me how much he loved going there with us on Tuesday.  He said that it is something that he'll remember forever and that he had a blast.  I love that!

Hi John and Jen!

Grandpa, Me, Michael

John, Jen, Me, Michael

Me, Michael and the fire extinguisher