Our Little Foray into City Life

Cleaning up my drafts folder, I found this old post that I never hit publish on - oops!  I'm feeling a little nostalgic for summer and all that walking we did, so here's a little flashback post....

Last summer, we rented a studio apartment in Minneapolis for the month before we closed on our house in the suburbs.  It was a fun little experiment in city life - and close quarters!

Trolley Ride!

We got to take a ride on Daniel Tiger's trolley near Lake Harriet.  Too bad it was so short - we probably could have spent a whole afternoon on it!  Baby J looks bummed, but really he was just waking up.

Sculpture Gardens

Most days, we didn't have a car, so we just walked all over the neighborhood.  That was awesome.  We took a field trip one morning to the sculpture gardens.

Lake + City skyline

We spent a lot of time walking around Lake Harriet and Lake Calhoun!  The walking/running/riding trails were great and no matter what time of day, people are out running and riding here!  We walked and explored our way to one of the many playgrounds and played outside all morning.

Our sleeping quarters were cozy, but no one complained.  And thankfully, none of the neighbors complained about our noise either!  Phew.

M's "bed."

We spent all morning, every morning, outside exploring the neighborhoods and playgrounds.  We'd finish with a lunch picnic, and then come home for an afternoon nap before heading back outside.

Waiting out the rain with Daniel Tiger

Doesn't he look like such a big boy here?  It was fun while it lasted, but we're so thankful for a bit more breathing room now! ;)

Scenes from the Weekend

We spent most of the weekend coughing and sniffling and feeling exhausted from a winter cold passing through the family.  But a couple little bursts of fresh air seemed to really help, so hopefully this week will be better.  

Here's my first cheese torta - a twist on our traditional pizza night.  Do you do a weekly pizza night?  This was delicious, but next time I'll use more cheese and way more sauce.  I made the dough in my bread machine.

We had lunch with Dan's lifelong friend and his wife on Saturday in Saint Paul, they are so great!  They spent some time in Tampa, FL, so the lunch was Gasparilla-themed.  D made construction paper pirate hats and M had so much fun he conked out on the way home.  We'll have to make it an annual celebration!

 

It's warmed up so much that we let M ride his strider bike on an afternoon walk.  It was a little bizarre biking beside the kids playing hockey on the outdoor rink!  I love the fact that our neighborhood has a skating rink.  D got me skates for Christmas so I'm going to have to try them out soon!

I had really hoped to get some nice runs in with the lovely weather, but just wasn't feeling it with this cold.  So I hardly ran at all in January, yikes!  Hopefully, February will be a little bit better.

Hope your month is off to a great start!