Gallery
Max's 30th Birthday Party
My brother-in-law Max turned 30 today and there was a nice get together at the Bayside Grill on Lake Minnetonka to celebrate. Just a few photos from the evening. I wasn’t able to get even a small fraction of all the people in attendance. Sorry to all those not pictured here.
Mazie Photo Shoot
Last Friday Mazie and I had a super fun “Daddy-Daughter” day filled with many fun things. Part of our fun day was a trip to a store to get a new dress (we ended up getting two) followed by a photo shoot in her new clothes. We decided to do the photo shoot in our front yard, taking advantage of all the wonderful tall grasses and native plants. Mazie had a ton of fun, and so did I behind the camera.
Photos from Wintergreen Dog Sledding Trip
I finally edited and uploaded the photos from the Wintergreen Dog Sledding Photography Workshop I did two weeks ago with Layne Kennedy. The workshop was amazing on all aspects. The dog sledding was great. The dogs were amazing. Layne did a great job teaching us how to take better photographs, and I truly think I stepped up my photography skills in a significant way from the trip.
At the end of the trip we put together a slide show of 10 shots from the trip that told the story of the trip. Layne really focused on getting us to ask ourselves “What are you trying to say with this shot?” when we looked through the viewfinder. It was an interesting learning experience, because I found that I had to really immerse myself in the experience to try and see that story. He also highlighted different types of shots, and thinking about how they will be used down the road.
I’m really happy with how they came out. It was great fun, and I really want to push my camera skills further.
Contribution to High Resolution Album Art
I’m a big fan of high resolution album art. It improves the overall music experience for me. I like having a high-quality album cover while listening to Apple TV. It’s a must for cover flow in iTunes. I recently went through and tried to close to 100% coverage of album art, which meant scanning some covers that I just couldn’t find anywhere on the Internet. I figured I should share that work, so that others can more easily put the right art on their music. Here are 11 covers all at 1,600 by 1,600 pixels that I scanned for my collection.
Dow Jones Disco Party 2007
Oh my. Really. Wow. Absolutely fabulous!
That is the only way to start any post on the 2007 Dow Jones Disco Party that we had this year. This years party was a complete blast. I had given a preview of the Disco Theme in another post and people did not hold back at all in going all out.
Great food. Amazing band, Boogie Wonderland. Disco music. Awesome people! How can you go wrong! Party along with this video!
Every year it gets better and I really cannot imagine how next year could top this one.
Butterball!
Tammy and I had a great time last night at the Butterball! Through the generosity of my friend Dan Grigsby, Tammy and I as well as the Tangen’s got on our best Black & White and headed out for a night of fun. The evening was packed. The Butterball sold out and raised a nice amount to help get food to those who need it.
The evening began with a silent auction. There were probably 50 items up for auction with a great variety of things. We put our name on a number of items and after surveying the area a bit decided to get serious about the live art. There was an artist on the stage who was doing a painting right there while everyone mingled. The artist was Chris Allen and he was doing a Graffiti piece. I really liked it for a bunch of different reasons so we focused on that and happily when 9:30 arrived we were the highest bidder. Great art, and for a great cause.
This is the piece that we got before framing and in really horrible light.
We ran into so many people that we knew at the Butterball. It made a fun evening even more enjoyable! After the auction ended Soul Asylum took the stage and put on a really amazing show!
I haven’t listened to much Soul Asylum for a while now and it was really fun to hear some of the great songs. The energy was great – really a fun show.
After a few hours of mingling and having a great time, we headed home in the chaos of Saturday night frenzy in downtown.
Sous Les Sapins
Photos from our weekend in Eastern Iowa staying at Sous Les Sapins Guesthouse with friends.
Mazie's First RenFest
This weekend we were adventurous and decided to take Mazie to her first Renaissance Festival! And just to keep things really interesting, we brought Izzy along as well. It was awesome. Everyone had a great time. Mazie really enjoyed it and had fun with just everything going on. Izzy did well, and was very interested when she realized there were bones laying around.
Green Lake Triathlon
Up and leaving really early for the Green Lake triathlon — Tammy’s first triathlon! Hector, Michelle, and Tammy are all participating. Proud of my Tammy’s triathlete status.
East Coast Adventure '06 - Day 27 - AT
Today we left Asheville and headed into the mountains. We drove about 30 miles northwest of Asheville to Hot Springs, NC. Hot Springs is one of the cities that the Appalachian Trail goes right through the middle of. The sidewalk that is on the main street of Hot Springs has “AT” trail blazes embedded right into the cement. Our visit was more to the AT than to Hot Springs, so Mazie loaded up into the kid carrier and we headed out for the trail.
I knew we weren’t going to get much of a hike in. I figured Mazie would make it an hour in the carrier and she did just about that. She did a great job walking by herself on the flats. She navigated the roots like a star and looked smashing in her bright green fury jacket.
It was fun to be on the AT and hiking with the white “blazes” of the AT in sight. Honestly the trail was no different than any other hiking trail we could have been on. However, this one could take you all the way to Maine if you just kept on walking. How cool is that?
Go to day: 3, 4, 8, 10, 12, 15, 16, 17, 22, 23, 24, 27, 28, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 37 or East Coast Adventure collection.
Mazie at 8 Weeks
This Tuesday Mazie will be 8 weeks old. It’s time for us to schedule her 2 month appointment. I remember thinking how insane that was. We went from the 2 week appointment and then 6 whole weeks without seeing professional help. How would we do it!? Well, it’s been fine. Mazie is doing great and so are we.
She’s put on a good amount of weight. She’s already well over 12 pounds. This last week in particularly seems to have been a watershed week. She’s been so much more engaging and interactive than ever before. She will smile and play with you for a while. She loves it when you tickle her and play with her while she’s on her changing table. Also, much to the pleasure of Tammy and I she’s actually started to smile at us, instead of randomly at walls and other objects in the house.
She’s been doing well with sleep, although sometimes she puts up a bit of a fuss trying to get to sleep. But once in the bed and snoring away, she does well. She seems to be spitting up a lot more lately than she did at first. I’m guessing that has to do in part with a lot more volume of milk going her way. It’s pretty funny how being a parent pretty much makes all your “eww, gross” reactions go away. A pile of spitup goes all over your shirt, you wipe off the visible stuff and continue on your way, no worries.
She’s a strong girl too. I’ve been holding her up and letting her support her weight with her legs. She can do this for a few seconds at a time and then needs a break. She likes to lean up against me in a standing position for minutes at a time.
That’s all for now. Of course I put up some more photos as well. You’ll notice two pictures of me sleeping with Mazie. This seems to be a not to uncommon occurrence.
Labor Day!
Labor day is such a bittersweet holiday. It is always a fun time, but for those of us in the Northern climates it signals the end of the summer and the coming of fall. This year it comes with even more bitterness since we have had such a sad excuse for a summer this year. It feels like fall is in full swing. As we were traveling this weekend it was obvious that the leaves were about to change. I bet it will be full fall color season in a week or two.
Tammy and I went to Lanesboro for much of the holiday weekend. We went to explore the Root River & Harmony-Preston Valley Sate Trail. Lanesboro is the perfect place to explore this more than 50 miles of wonderfully paved bike trails. Out of here we had three days of great riding. We started Friday night with a short ride from Lanesboro to Fountain for 22.4 miles round trip. Then on Saturday we did a longer ride from Lanesboro to Houston which was 62.2 miles round trip and finished on Sunday with a ride to Harmony and back for 45 miles total. We got around 130 miles in for the three days and had some really great trails.
We stayed at the Habberstad House Bed & Breakfast. This is a great B&B! It was at the top of the list with our favorite B&Bs that we have ever stayed in. The owners, Nancy and Dave, are fabulous. The rooms are great, and breakfast was wonderful. We will definitely revisit upon a return to Lanesboro.
In addition to cycling in Lanesboro we also added a piece to our art collection. We stopped by the Cornucopia Art Center while we were there and saw some work by a Superior, WI artist named Erik Pearson that we really liked. We can’t wait for it to arrive. It’s unique and different than our other art and I think it’s going to be great fun.
We returned to the cities and a lot of rain. Due to the rain we ended up not going to the Jack Johnson concert we had tickets to and instead went to see Collateral. Good movie, lots of action. It was a bit predictable though.
On Labor Day Tammy ran the MDRA Victory 10k. I got up early and rode my bike up there to get some miles in and watch her do the run. I really don’t like getting up at 6:30 am on a holiday, but it also lets you get so much done in the day! I had a nice ride to the run and then cheered on runners as they went by. I saw a shirt for this movement called Run Against Bush. Pretty amazing how motivated our current president has made people, myself included.
All in all, a great, relaxing holiday! I put up some miscellaneous photos if you’re interested.
Renaissance Festival
We made our 2nd trip of the year to the Renaissance Festival, this time with Tracy and Jeff. The RenFest is like a one day vacation. Great time to laze around in the afternoon, have some cheap wine and enjoy some relaxation.
