Minnesota

For our trip this past summer we drove to see my sister who lives in Minnesota. We had a lovely time! It's a beautiful state and we really enjoyed ourselves. Minnesota is a prime state to grow hostas in so my sister took me to several great nurseries and even a home garden tour. Talk about beautiful plants! I managed to buy quite a few and load up the rental car to capacity. 

 They took us all over their town and we had a nice time shopping and hanging out. It was a nice relaxing trip and I'm so glad we went to see them.

They have a fun back yard with ropes and hammocks, kids had fun!

We said bye to my sister and drove to Minneapolis to catch a Foo Fighters concert. It was at Target Field. What an experience! We parked at our hotel and took the metro downtown to the Twins baseball field. The weather was questionable with possible rain so I took a poncho (couldn't get anyone else to take one). We bought nosebleed seats way at the top, which also happened to be under a roof. As we were waiting for the concert to start we watched the dark clouds roll in and it started pouring on everyone except the nosebleed seats, yay us. They delayed the concert slightly and squeegeed the rain off the stage but then all was good. Great concert! Got out very late and then the rain started again on our metro ride home. Torrential downpour. We had to get off at our stop and make a run for the hotel which was probably half a mile away. I was quite dry in my poncho, my family not so much. It sure made for a memorable trip. 

Portrait Mode

I'd had an old iPhone 6 forever and decided it was time to upgrade it (even though there wasn't anything wrong with it). I replaced it with a refurbished iPhone 13 Pro Max and love it! The new camera is fun to play with and I snapped some pictures of the kids while waiting in the airport. They are my cute and goofy kids.

 I also like to take it outside and snap pictures of the critters. 

Birthday Boy

My oldest just turned 17 and will be starting their senior year of high school this fall. Time is a thief as I swear this kid just turned 10 the other day. I'm super proud of him and am excited to see where his future takes him.The birthday hat has made it 17 years now!

 

Well

 When Sean's Dad was here I asked if he'd be able to help Sean get our well working. It's been dead for a decade and we've just been using rural water to water all the plants. Last summer our water bill was getting a little high so it was time to figure out how to get the well working again. I knew between the two of them they'd come up with a good plan and they did. It's a seasonal well that we will drain and put in the shop for the winter but it works great and all of my plants are very happy! Thanks Rich and Sean!

Happy plants!

This and That

Well the range anxiety finally got to me and we sold our little 2013 Nissan Leaf and bought a 2022 Leaf with the extended range. The old one was maxed out at 65-70 miles range and the new one will go 230 miles at least. It's like night and day! I love it. With the federal tax credit of $4K off on used electric vehicles it was a steal.

 

We had it delivered from Denver.

Charges in the garage on a normal outlet.

Wesley had his first college visit. It's crazy that this time next year we will be preparing to move him into a dorm! Time flies!

I started singing in the choir at church again (I took an extended break after Covid). Both kids are great singers and after a little coercing I got them to sing too. We sang an Easter Cantata with 5 songs and it was a lot of fun, especially singing with my kids. 

Our heat pump finally died after Christmas so Sean started the hunt for another unit that he could install himself. Luckily we had electric resistance heat to get us through the winter but needed something installed before the heat of summer arrived. He did a great job, I'm so happy to have an air conditioner!

The tortoise house is coming along slowly. We got the door installed and the two windows on each side put in. Next step is siding and insulation. I hope the tortoises can go out in it this winter!

Seeds

 I really do love growing things. It's my passion at the moment and the growing season is my favorite time of the year. Winter proves to be difficult lately. I missed growing for the 6 months of the year that were to cold to grow in. Then I found out how fun growing stuff indoors was! Last fall I bought some rather expensive streaked hosta seeds online from several growers. I thought if I purchased from many different growers I'd have a good chance of ending up with some pretty seedlings. Each packet of seeds was about $20-30, which turned out to be around a buck a seed. I'd put a packet in each solo cup and see what came up. 

Once the cup got too full I'd sit in the basement and pull all the seedlings out and separate them into their own cup. I tried to only keep the streaked and or unique leafed seedlings since there were literally hundreds of them. 

They eventually took up most of the floor in the basement under grow lights near the end of winter. Once the weather got nice they started their move outside but whenever the weather got cold at night I'd bring them all inside in our entryway and then back outside the next day. It was a labor of love. I ended up with some real unique beauties! I'm looking forward to another winter of basement growing.