Last night Eric and I went to a painting class so Eric could discover his creative process. It really is lame.  He had to participate in some creative activity…the teacher suggested a Poetry Reading.  Eric said NO! And decided the lessor of all the creative evils was painting. I think he picked it because he knew I would go with him. He is so smart.  Here are pictures of Eric’s masterpiece in process and our final product. It was fun, I’m not too happy with this one like I was with the birds but it is way better than the stupid wine bottles I did last year. By the way, Eric was the token man in the class. Every class I’ve gone to has had only one guy.  Last night was Eric’s turn. LOL!

 The long 4th of July weekend is over.  I’m so sad. I really enjoyed my 4 day mini vacation.  Let’s see what did I do all weekend?  I spent quite a bit of time in the car, hence the “road tripping” title.  After work Wednesday we got an oil change…exciting I know!  Then we went for a little ride around Chaska, Carver and Jordan.  I wanted to see if the Minnesota Valley SRA campground was open.  We had quite a bit of rain a while back and the river was near flooding in Shakopee so I thought it might affect the campground. Surprisingly, it is closed for the season.  I’m not sure why and the DNR website doesn’t say why.

Thursday we went to Boston Market for lunch and took it to the local park and had a picnic. Not your typically picnic fare but it was cheap (50% off family meals). There is a really nice park by our Boston Market.  We walked around the park and enjoyed the warm air.  After that, I had to go to the 4th of July Celebration in Eden Prairie.  We played our annual concert. Normally we leave afterwards but my friend, Jenny, convinced us to stay for the fireworks.  So we stuck around and watch her kids play in the new playground in the park.  The fireworks were not bad, the show last about 25 minutes.  After fireworks there was a massive traffic jam and it took us almost an hour to get home.

Friday morning we went to the DMV at the courthouse (and stood in a very long line) to renew Eric’s driver’s license and to renew the tabs on our car…$332 later we came home with stickers and a piece of paper saying Eric can drive.  Man the State of Minnesota likes their taxes!  

We packed up the car and slowly made our way to Rice Lake State Park in Owatonna.  We definitely didn’t take the most direct route, we went through towns I’ve never been to before. We decided the weather was perfect for camping.  We met DJ and Ethan there.  We walked down to the lake (which they are drawing down :( this summer so no canoeing) and that was about the extent of our hike.  We made burgers on the open fire…I am very impressed at my outdoor cooking skills. And of course the delicious s’ mores later. We didn’t stay up too late which is unusual. Sleeping was very comfortable.  The weather was perfect.  We awoke to the birds chirping and the massive amount of daddy long leg spiders covering our tent. Thankfully they were on the outside! We packed up our site and headed to Mankato.  Danielle asked us to come see her new place.  We went out for lunch and then spent some time at her new apartment. It was nice, the typical starting out apartment.  We left there in time to make it back for 4:30 Mass.  Of course it wouldn’t make sense to take the most direct route so instead we decided to venture into Le Sueur; you know the home of the Jolly Green Giant.  Not really out of our way but it was nice to finally see what the town looks like. After driving to Mankato for over 10 years and seeing the sign for Le Sueur, I finally drove through the town.  It was cute.

Yesterday was a day of relaxation. But it was stinking hot we decided to get wet to cool off. We went to the water park at Valleyfair and hit all the slides, lazy river, raging rapids and of course the wave pool.  We were there about 2 hours.  We were starving afterwards so we went to Eden Prairie to Punch Pizza (delicious!).  After a couple of hours of watching TV, I treated Eric to Dairy Queen.  We got a car wash too and decided to “dry it off” by going for a ride.  Well the ride didn’t start off that great because the concrete on Hwy 169 exploded which put us in a very long line up of cars going very slowly.  Then we drove down to Jim’s Apple Farm for some candy.  I found maltesers…my favorite!   Look a whole box:  

Isn’t it disappointing that is the only picture I took the whole weekend!  And it is blurry! I’m really losing my photography abilities! We took the back roads back home and ran into a thunderstorm. So much for drying off the car.  LOL!

As you can tell the long weekend involved two things, eating and driving.  And I wouldn’t have it any other way!

I was sitting in a meeting on Tuesday and all of a sudden I was extremely tired, my throat started to hurt and I got the chills. I thought to myself…CRAP, not again!  I just had a cold 3 weeks ago and was finally over it. I had chills the rest of day and couldn’t wait to get home. I was so tired all I wanted to do was sleep.  I had a volleyball game at 9:15pm so I had to stay awake.  I struggled playing. I had enough energy for one game. The other 3 games were a struggle.  I had a rough night sleep because I ached all over and I had a splitting headache. I finally called in sick. My first sick day since Eric had surgery a couple years ago. I’m so glad I did. I slept in until 10am and did nothing all day except play Candy Crush.

Thursday I went back to work and visited our Health Services.  I thought for sure I had strep throat.  Typical symptoms, sore throat, couldn’t swallow, swollen/painful glands, white spots, headaches, fever.  Well they took the strep test and it was inconclusive. The nurse practitioner, aka the “quack,”  told me I had bronchitis. HUH?  I was not congested, I didn’t have sinus pain, I wasn’t stuffed up, I could breathe just fine and I wasn’t coughing.  Where the heck did that diagnosis come from? So I left there questioning the staff my company has hired for our Health Services.  Even the people I work with thought she was a quack. Well the quack got it right. Thursday night I had sinus pressure, stuffed up noise, it hurt to breathe and coughing. Great! The other weird thing about the visit…the measured my waist…what is that about?

Today was an exciting day.  I got my new stove.  I know this is just a few weeks after my exciting new toilet. But the last time I cleaned our stove, I practically died of the fumes from EZ-Off. I told Eric “I’m never cleaning this stove again; next time it needs to be cleaned, I’m getting a new stove.”  Well that was a while ago, and the old stove desperately needed to be cleaned. Eric wouldn’t let me go back on my proclamation so we bought a new stove. This new stove is great.  It is so much better than my old one.  It is glass top, it has self-cleaning, a timer and a LIGHT!  No more trying to find my little flashlight to see if the cookies are done. I’m so excited!   I christened it with a pizza of course.  It worked great. I also made eggs, browned hamburger, fried bacon and made twice-baked potatoes. Tonight I’m making a cookie/brownie recipe.  It is getting a work out on its first day of service.

I also bought new cookware from Kohl’s.  It is Bobby Flay’s (whoever the heck he is) stainless steel set.  So far, so good. I figure, new stove, new cookware.  Plus my old set is non-stick and the Teflon is starting to flake. It is not cool when I’m eating mashed potatoes and I see black flecks of Teflon.  Can’t that stuff kill you?  So anyways, I went for a high quality stainless.  I fear that my food will stick to it but so far neither the hamburger nor the bacon stuck.  I guess the true test is the next time I make eggs.  I hear those can be tricky.

Here is my new toilet...in all its glory. I never thought I'd be so happy with something so basic as a toilet but I do.  It is my new thrown.  Pope Francis has his, now I have mine.

If something this easy makes me happy, I wonder...hum...what should I replace next?  Maybe the hideous 1990's green diamond linoleum in the bathroom...yuck!