Tourist Activities

No visit to Minneapolis is complete without a stop at the falls.

We hiked down to the Mississippi and checked out the cave on the south side of Minnehaha Creek. The sides were full of modern petroglyphs, which makes you wonder if the old petroglyphs we find out west are the same sort of thing.

What goes down must go up. With no leaves on the trees, the stairs up look like the Great Wall.

 

Chilly Ballgame

The G's popped in for a fun weekend visit. Good thing that Twins Baseball is back in full swing!

We had our normal perfect seats above first base. Normally, we are glad to be out of the sun, but on game day, it was in the low 50s with a breeze. 

The girls abandoned us and made their way to the sundrenched sections out past third base. By the end of the game, our original section had emptied out, and the cheap seats in the sun were packed.

 

Morning Swim

S is still put out that the ice has gone away, but he is enjoying getting back to his morning swims.

 

Patch Job

We are expecting guests, so we can't keep up the kitchen floor project. We put some plywood and the old flooring down and covered it up with a rug.

 

Portrait Setting

In addition to the long exposure setting, the iPhone also has a nice "portrait" setting that uses its depth camera to blur the background. A normal camera does this by having a large aperture lens. The iPhone has a wide aperture (f/1.66), but because the lens is so physically small (6.9 mm), it's difficult to get a shallow depth of field so that the background blurs. The camera knows where, in terms of depth, the subject is, and the distance to everything else in the scene, and it uses the depth information to artificially blur whatever is not in the same plane as the subject.

 

R30

We insulated the external foundation wall with some rigid foam and then added 10" (R30) of fiberglass between the floor joists.

 

Coots

We've had a ton of migratory birds other than the normal ducks, geese, & swans this year. For a few days we had a large flock of coots that refueled while they waited for the ice up north to thaw.

 

Subfloor Project

The kitchenette area is part of an old addition to the original house. The floor was insulated with an inch of cellulose that had long since fallen away. We want to put a radiator under the window, but the plumbing to it needs to be in an insulated space. Under the floor is a dirt floor about two feet down that is separate from the rest of the basement.

The old subfloor boards came up relatively easily with the Sawzall.

Naturally, the cat was very interested. She climbed all around and removed all the cobwebs for me.

 

Moving Day

We made our last trip to Lanark to help Nana move to OKC. We stayed at the motel next to the Lake Carroll bait shop and were impressed with their wine selection. Not your typical bait shop.

We hung out at the bait shop and had lunch while the packers loaded the truck. Too bad it was in the 40s; it would have been fun to sit outside.

 

Merganser Photos

The dog started baking at this strange thing floating in the water near shore. It took a while to realize what it was: a professional photographer in their blind shooting with a high-powered lens.

I'd love to have a setup like that, but I don't have a job and my phone is doing well enough capturing mergansers for me right now.

 

Long Exposures

The entire reason I switched to an iPhone was for its camera. One of my favorite features is the "live" setting that allows for hand-held long exposure shots. Normally you'd need a tripod to take long exposures. This is where the Lake Harriet flowage merges into Minnehaha Creek.

 

Car Show

We hit the Minneapolis Car Show (and Brits pub) again this year. 2025 will be a car buying year for us, so we checked out all the options. I personally liked the Mystery Machine van.

 

New Building Foundation

The building on the corner is progressing slowly. The new foundation was poured this week.

 

Storm on Jupiter

It might look like one of the storms on Jupiter, but it's really only some foam in the Mississippi beneath the dam.

 

Sea Salt Season Opener

We had beautiful weather for opening day at Sea Salt next to the falls. JP had the crab cakes, and S & I enjoyed a basket of clam fries.

There was still a fair amount of ice beneath the falls.

We hiked down to the confluence of Minnehaha Creek and the Mississippi.

 

Morning Walks

I've been taking advantage of the ability to waste an hour or two walking around the lake with the dog. Springtime is happening, and the bandshell restoration construction is nearing completion. Hopefully the Bread & Pickle will open soon!

 

Sofa Cat

V enjoys sitting with us on the sofa each night. She won't usually lie on the pillow unless we put down a soft blanket for her.

 

Pantry

JP's new pantry is complete except for the door that is due in three weeks. She is very happy to not have to lug the mixer, instapot, or slow cooker up the stairs any more.

The pantry project was a good warmup and wakeup call for us about doing the rest of the kitchen floor. There's a lot to it, and with a 100 year old house, nothing is as it seems.

 

Loon Season

The loons and mergansers have arrived and taken up residence in the lake. S could not care less. He is still mad about the ice going away.

 

Pantry Project

The pantry project contains a bit of everything other than plumbing. We framed in a doorway and cut & stained the oak trim. Getting a decent match was a pain! We ended up doing four coats of stain; not ideal in a 45° garage. 

 

Long Way Home

We took the long way home from dropping the boys off at the train station and explored a bit. The falls were on the way and there was no one there, so we stopped for a quick look. The ice is almost gone.

 

Train to Chicago

The boys took the train from St. Paul to Chicago for a concert at House of Blues. 

For the outbound journey, they rode the Empire Builder on its way from Portland. It had eleven passenger cars and a dining car. They took the new Borealis commuter train back, which was spartan and only had four cars. Both said they really enjoyed the big train.

 

Spring Snow

We got a surprise snowstorm that dropped 3" of beautiful wet snow. The dog was loving it!

Pantry Demo

With the new floor complete, we decided to convert the wine bar area into a pantry. We like the wine fridge out in the main kitchen area, and JP doesn't have enough storage space for all the kitchen appliances.

The glass tiles were stubborn; we ended up pulling off the sheetrock on the back wall.