North Shore Weekend Log
Friday
- Drive to Duluth.
- Pizza and beer at Ursa Minor Brewery.
- Ice cream at Love Creamery.
- Check into Airbnb just past Duluth.
- Hot tub & homework.
- Pre-order donuts at World’s Best Donuts in Grand Marais.
Saturday
- Drive to Grand Marais.
- Stop at Fika Coffee for delicious coffee.
- Pickup donuts at World’s Best Donuts.
- Traipsed around Artist Point taking photos and exploring.
- Walked out on pier to Grand Marais Light.
- Shopping around Grand Marais: Lake Superior Trading Post, Joynes Ben Franklin, The Sweetwater Co., Great Gifts, The Big Lake, The Market, Sivertson Art Gallery, and Drury Lane Books.
- Last customer at Crosby Bakery.
- Surprising rush of dining demand at 4pm — dinner at Angry Trout Cafe.
- Ice cream at Superior Creamery.
- Return to Airbnb.
Sunday
- Send Weekly Thing 296.
- Check out Of Airbnb.
- Get candy to bring home from Great Lakes Candy Kitchen.
- Fabulous lunch at New Scenic Cafe.
- Delightful time at Gooseberry Falls.
- Visit Glensheen Mansion.
- Dinner at Va Bene in Duluth.
- Drive home.
Morning stop at the Great Lakes Candy Kitchen — treats for home!
Artists Point in Grand Marais.
World’s Best Donuts in Grand Marais. Pro tip: you can order the night before and skip the line entirely!
Stop at Fika Coffee, my favorite coffee shop on the North Shore, on our way to Grand Marais this morning.
Our Airbnb for the weekend up north is a converted garage set in the woods. Nice place!
Exploring FIFA Collect
I’ve been intrigued with FIFA Collect for a bit. My interest was piqued when I saw that they are dropping collectibles with “Right to Buy” for the 2026 World Cup and I am very hopeful to go to at least a match. I’m guessing tickets will not be easy to get so getting a “Right to Buy” collectible for the city that I want to go to might be really nice.
This morning I sat down with FIFA Collect and really figured out how it works. I was generally impressed. It is a full NFT solution built on the Algorand blockchain. I have used a ton of blockchains but hadn’t had a reason to use Algorand. Algorand is not a Ethereum ecosystem blockchain so I downloaded Pera wallet to get started. Then I bought $20 USD worth of ALGO on Coinbase, transferred to my wallet and swapped 100 ALGO for 12.232474 of USDC-a, which is the USDC stablecoin token for Algorand.
A few minutes later I purchased my first FIFA collectible on the marketplace, a World Cup 1994 USA #611 poster.
I can buy some drops and hope I get lucky to find a “right to buy” collectible. Alternatively, there are already collectibles on the marketplace that others are selling with those rights. Right now the cheapest “right to buy” collectibles are selling for around $300.
Delicious pizza and beer at Ursa Minor Brewing tonight in Duluth.
Many of the SPS Commerce leadership team took in the Minnesota Business Partnership annual event. We were joined by Megan Tischler who was highlighted in the evening for the work she has done as part of our Women in Technology group and Phil Soran who is one of our board members.
Tyler and I were joined by Max and Levi at Orchestra Hall today to see the Minnesota Orchestra perform Star Wars: A New Hope In Concert. Tyler and I saw The Last Jedi In Concert in May.
We had a great time cheering the runners in the Twin Cities Marathon this morning! Our friends host a Marathon morning every year with the highlight being a “Repeat 1” playing of Jump Around by House of Pain — a favorite with the runners.
We saw The Wild Robot tonight at Edina 4. It was a new story to most of us however Mazie had read the book. I thought the animation style was very unique and fit the story well. Fabulous family movie outing!
The Thingelstad and Fernandez families ready for the TC 5K!
Results
- Mazie (45798): 7:12 min/mile pace — amazing! Came in 12th out of 1,335 women and 2nd in her age group! It seems we have a runner in our family! 🤩
- Tammy (45796): Came in 7th in her age group and put in a 8:53 min/mile pace! Impresive!
- Tyler (45797): Ran the whole thing sub 10 minute pace and building endurance!
- Jamie (45799): Walked the course and hit goal of sub 15 minute miles — 14:58! We’ll skip places in divisions for me. 😊
Ordered these awesome new MNUFC license plates for my car! Go Loons! ⚽️
Transferring to the new iPhone 16 Pro!
Tammy and I went to see the Cowboy Junkies at The Dakota tonight. Both of us have enjoyed the Cowboy Junkies but hadn’t seem them live. The show was good and featured a bunch of new music, but got a little long for us with two different sets.
Tammy and I went to a very cool small performance by Gary Louris of The Jayhawks and Golden Smog at O’Shaughnessy Distilling. Just him and his guitar for 90 minutes.
Our Favorite Cheeseburgers
Since we just tried a new burger place I thought it would be fun to capture our favorite places that the Thingelstad family goes to for cheeseburgers.
-
Lion’s Tap: this is not a smash burger but it is a delicious classic cheeseburger. The standard bearer.
-
Tap Society: this is closest to our house and the burger here has evolved over the years. It is always good and a bonus that their fries and shakes are top notch too.
-
Lake & Irving: the cheeseburger here is heavenly.
-
The Dakota: there are much fancier items on the menu, but the double cheeseburger at the Dakota is great and one of the cheaper items on the menu.
-
Flat Top: Honestly the best, and only true smash burger we get is the one I make on the flat top at the cabin. I haven’t found many (any?) restaurants that truly let the patty adhere to the grill surface to be scraped off. It adds a lot of time and effort.
We made our way to Wells Roadside tonight to try the newest smash burger place. This place has a cool location with a very classic drive-in feel. They specialize in wagyu smash burgers and are intentionally very affordable. You can get a double cheeseburger and fries for a very reasonable price.
