Tuesday, October 21, 2008

Sunday Date

Several weeks ago Mike and I were downtown in the Old Market to celebrate Mike's birthday. As we often do when we are in this part of the city, we spent some time walking through the various art galleries and stores. While in one we picked up a brochure for something called Studio and Vine, and it intrigued us. Wine? Art? Fall colors? Sign me up!

We did a little more research and discovered that "Studio and Vine" was a bus tour through part of the Loess Hills in western Iowa. The bus stopped at three wineries and two artist studios over the course of a Sunday afternoon. We thought it sounded wonderful, and invited our wine club to join us. While we had several people interested, by the time Sunday arrived no one else could go, so it ended up being just a nice day away for Mike and I.

We were a little nervous when we received an email telling us to meet at the senior center in Council Bluffs, but our fears were quickly dismissed when we drove up and saw all varities of ages represented. So our adventure began!

Our first stop was at Sugar Clay Winery, which won the award for the most beautiful area of the day. You may enjoy their wine if you enjoy the taste of dirty socks, but I would probably skip Sugar Clay next time. However, the scenery was beautiful, so I may return with my own wine just to enjoy the area!








Our next stop was King Crossing Winery. After our first experience we didn't hold high hopes, but we were pleasantly surprised. No wine stood out like dirty socks, and there were a few that we would like to try again. The medieval decor was really fun, and the views of the vineyard were gorgeous.









The next stop was an art gallery located in a little barn in the country. While it was quite unassuming from the outside, the photography displayed indoors took my breath away. The art is by John and Debora Scanlan, and it is simply beautiful.

That's all for now...coming soon...more pics, one more winery, and one more studio.

Saturday, October 11, 2008

Lame Excuse for a Blog Post...

Yes, I know it's not a real update...but hopefully this will satisfy all curious onlookers until I get my act together enough to post pictures and write about the 5th birthday that someone in our house just experienced. Mike is gone for the weekend so I've been dividing my time between being ultra-productive and fairly lazy, which is just the perfect balance. At any rate, a real post is going to come soon, but for now, I've been tagged!

So...


4 things...
I was tagged by Annette...so here we go!

4 things I was doing 10 years ago:
*Teaching 7th/8th grade in Worthington, MN.
*Adjusting to living life for the very first time on my own, without any roommate.
*I can't remember anything else too exciting! :)
*Nope, still nothing.

4 things on my to-do list for today:
*Clean Leah's toyroom (in progress...)
*Take Leah out for pizza (just got home)
*Do the dishes (done!)
*Read a book (soon!)

4 jobs I have had: (I've had many odd jobs. Mike keeps encouraging me to do a blog series about them. Perhaps I shall...)
*Dental assistant (first job!)
*Dairy Queen
*Cook at a summer camp
*Typed/Read phone conversations between the hearing and deaf/hard of hearing

4 movies I have watched more than once:
*Pretty Woman
*Never Been Kissed
*Shawshank Redemption
*The Princess Bride

4 places I have lived:
*Sioux Falls, SD
*Warwick, NY
*Worthington, MN
*Atlanta, GA


4 places I have been this year:
*Southern California
*Colorado Springs, CO
*Sioux Falls, SD
*Boelus, NE

4 places I want to visit:
*Tuscany
*Sydney
*Disneyworld
*Montreal

4 TV shows I watch:
*Amazing Race
*Monk
*Friends (still!)
*Ace of Cakes

4 things you may not know about me:
*I hate daily cleaning, but I love a big cleaning project. (Which works out well for someone who hates daily cleaning!)
*I love searching for good travel deals on the internet (even when I'm not going anywhere!)
*I love to read a good romantic suspense book...and often do judge a book by it's cover (much to my husband's dismay).
*I just quit one of my two jobs this week...for many reasons, but I am looking forward to having dinner at home with my family more than once a week. Gulp!

Hey, consider yourself tagged if you read this and are in a blogging slump like me!