Minnesota

Twin Cities: First Snowfall 2010

Brianne Bilyeu, , 762 Comments

This is a collection of photos and quotes gathered from my Facebook friends and Twitter peeps about Saturday’s roundhouse, no holds barred, smack you upside the head, first snowfall of 2010 for the Twin Cities and greater metro area.  Thanks to all of those who gave me permission to share your photos here.

From Brianne in Minneapolis

It tis a pretty white wonderland out there!  Love the first few snowfalls!  So pretty and why am I up so early?

WTF, snow?

Negative: I have to drive to Bloomington within the hour.  Positive: I’ve had snow tires on since May.

If you haven’t been outside yet: You don’t want to be outside #Slipocalypse

Snow is a four-letter word.

Heavy, wet snow.  We have a couple of inches and it is expected to fall all day; and we have an invite to a patio party this evening.  Life in Minnesota!

I want a f*cking award for driving to Bloomington in a #slopocalypse

From Annetta in Minneapolis

: SNOW! </giddy>

Good thing I allowed extra time to get to work.  Took me 12 minutes!  Double the norm.  God bless 4-wheel drive and anti-lock brakes.

Aaaand my little corner of Minnesota officially has snow!  WI is wet and cold, but the fluffy harbinger Old Man Winter is nowhere to be seen.

Ummmm…….. that’s a lot of freakin’ snow.  Good thing I planned to be hibernating today.

Today I get to go to Edmonton.  I snow.  IN SNOW.  I LOVE SNOOOWO+WWWW

Snow must be very heavy.  The tree branches are sagging.

IT’S NOT WINTER THE SUN IS SHINING LA LA LA I CAN’T HEAR YOU

From Annetta in Minneapolis

The kids were so excited to stuff themselves into snow gear and get out there this morning!

Plan for the day?  Stay inside while I love the hell out of the man outside shoveling.  Then curling up inside while we test this Netflix online thing.  Mmm, hibernation!

Five cars in ditch and one awesome dude if front of us who went into the median, FLOORED the gas and pulled a U-ie, drove into the opposite lane.  Lucky for him there was no oncoming traffic.  I cheered.  Might as well have been a Viking touchdown.

Nothing goes better with snow than a hot bowl of pho and happy hour drink specials until 5pm.  Cheers, Hai – Ngon Bistro

Holed up in my hermit cave with pizza fixins I picked up yesterday.  I sense baking madness shall overtake me today.  On this day of snow.

I really wish I could hibernate.

Alright!  Shoveling snow. I think my arms are pretty much disabled for the rest of the day.

From Lynn in Cleveland

I. LOVE. SNOW. And if you don’t, suck it up!

Snow is wonderful if you don’t have to go out in it.  I love snow, but after having to drive through the worst of it, work all day, dig my car out, and then shovel the driveway, I’m temporarily over it.  Maybe I’ll feel better tomorrow.

Need something to keep out the cold.  Is scotch and hot chocolate a bad idea?

This snow is very very wet and very very sh*tty to shovel.

It’s absolutely wild out there…streets here aren’t plowed yet and the snow just keeps coming.  We did make it to the store for necessities and are staying in today with a fire, games and soup.

Power just went out @ the mall.  Awesome!

Have one boy outside in the snow and one boy on the couch under a blanket watching Spiderman 3.  Got a whole bunch of wet jackets and mittens drying in the bathtub on a rack for the next go round.  I’m a little worried about my mom, her power is out from the snow.  I braved it and went grocery shopping and now it’s all about staying tucked in.

From Sunny in Shakopee

What a crappy day.

D. is literally trapped in her house because there are two trees blocking the exit from her street.

If it wasn’t so wet, if it wasn’t for the snow plow (twice), if it wasn’t for the depth….this shoveling thing might not be so bad.

Our awesome crew of Delivery Men and Women will passionately and speedily bring you piping hot Pizza Luce Pizza all the while making it look easy.  We RULE at delivery, especially when it snows.

Okay, freaking out a bit.  My gutters are now bending from the weight.  I’m hideously afraid of heights and can’t get up on the roof to clear out the gutters.  I’m worried they are going to bust.  DAMN IT!!!!!

Perfect day to be watching a marathon of “In Living Color”

This weather’s been messing with my sinuses all day.

From Forrest in Columbia Heights

i hate snow.

It’s a damn good thing F. got the lawn raked last night – cuz today he has to shovel up to 10 inches of snow.  God I love having a man around.

Worried about how heavy the snow is.  Anyone else having pounding on their roof from it dropping from tree branches?  Praying the power doesn’t go out!

It’s still 60 degrees in Chicago.  I will try to convince the weather to come with me when I return tomorrow.

Snow… blech!

Ok, I’ve already done my first round of shoveling for the day.  That’s the only way I can keep up with it, it’s so wet and slushy!  Sure is pretty though.

I think this definitely qualifies as a “storm”.  I’ve gotten so used to meteorologists trying to create drama with severe forecasts that I just kind of assumed there would just be a few flakes.

From Kammy in Minneapolis

Seeing a vivid-red cardinal in a snow-flocked tree reminds me of the beauty of the seasons.  I’ll be trying to remember that while shoveling!

It’s officially winter: Minneapolis declares the first Snow Emergency of the season.

F*ck you, snow.  Just f*ck you.

Mmmm…wine and a snowy evening snuggled in with my two favorite men.  Nothing could be better.

PLOW THE F*CKING ROADS – RT@MnDPS_MSP Of the 401 crashes today, 45 were with injuries

From Kammy in Minneapolis

It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas!

Being cold sucks, shoveling snow sucks, driving and walking in the snow sucks.. but it’s so beautiful!

meh….fraking snow.

Happy snow, everyone! *le SQUEEEEEEEE!*

It’s only 4:45.  Dark descending.  Surrounded by snow.  Lassie, go get Timmy!

Twin Cities: First Snowfall 2010
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Hiking Cottage Grove Ravine Park

Brianne Bilyeu, , , 1,223 Comments

I bought this book called Best Hikes of the Twin Cities by Kate Havelin.  It has a list of 31 parks in Minneapolis, St. Paul and the Greater Metro Area.

Each park profile lists the park’s location, directions for how to get there, an overview/history of the park, recommended trails, types of terrain, facilities, costs and contacts.  The author breaks the parks down into several groups:

.

  • Kate’s Top 10
  • Night Hikes
  • Hilly Hikes
  • Easy Hikes
  • Birding Hikes
  • Wildflower Hikes
  • Winter Hikes
  • River Hikes
  • Bike Trails

The only thing that I don’t like about the book’s layout are the maps of the park trails.  They’re not very detailed, and the only information that most of the maps provide is the general shape of the “featured” trail.  Accessory/alternate trails aren’t shown and the landmarks are kind of iffy, especially for forested areas.  I’ve tried to use the maps as trail guides a few times and have ended up off the path and unable to make my way back to the “main” route.

But I do like the book for finding and trying out new parks.  Last week we decided that we wanted to take a hilly hike that wasn’t too far away, and using the guide we ended up at Cottage Grove Ravine Park in Cottage Grove Minnesota.  The park in all of it’s autumn splendor and the hills weren’t crazy steep or abundant.  There area was lush, the paths were well-tended, and the lake was very pretty.  There weren’t a lot of people taking advantage of the park, so we felt like we had the entire place to ourselves.

Hiking Cottage Grove Ravine Park

Marian Call in Minneapolis(ish)

Brianne Bilyeu, , , 645 Comments

I’m going to see her tonight!

I only recently heard about Marian Call through Twitter, and again through her performances at W00tstock.  I joined her Facebook fan page not too long ago, listened to her music for free through her website and bought her CD Got to Fly via iTunes.  Have I mentioned how much I love the internet and social networking?

Anyway, Marian Call sings folksy, acoustic-type music with a heavy emphasis on geek culture and humor.  She’s known for her fan music about Firefly and Battlestar Galactica.

She’s a biiiiiig geek, and I <3 that.

The cool/scary thing about the performance tonight is that it’s going to be at Dunn Bros. in Roseville.  I love small shows like this.  People are being encouraged to bring their own chairs, and with such a large geek/nerd contingent in the Twin Cities (W00tstock Minneapolis sold out like *that* – imagine me snapping my fingers there), I have no doubt that there will be a lot of people standing.  Which is good, and I’ll have a chance to get (really) up close and personal with my fellow geeks.

I should definitely do a deoderant re-apply before I get there.

Anyway, my bit o’ geek for the day is that I’m taking off early to go hang out at Dunn Bros. so I can try to get a decent seat.  Also, this is an excuse to leave work early and continue re-reading The Demon-Haunted World in remembrance of Carl Sagan’s birthday.  Carl Sagan died in 1996, but today he would have been 76.

~~~~~~~

Update with PHOTOS!

Marian Call was awesome.  I actually did arrive about four hours early for the show, but a couple of my other friends also showed up around then.  I didn’t get much reading done in Demon-Haunted World, but we all hung out, played on our computers and had a grand old time.  One of my friends actually crocheted me a Jayne Hat in a little less than two hours in honor of the show and Marian’s Firefly fan songs.

Marian was friendly and chatty, the crowd was waaaay smaller than I expected (I’m bad at estimating, but…maybe 50 people?) and very well-behaved, and the sound was good.  This was probably the smallest, most intimate concert I’ve attended.  At the mid-show break and after the show Marian hung out and spoke with the audience and took pics with people.  Everything was very laid back and enjoyable.

~~~

Marian in Saffron garb for It Was Good For You Too

~~~

 

One Nation, Under Jayne!

 

Photo by @belmikey and posted with permission.  His complete set of pictures from the evening can be found here.

Marian Call in Minneapolis(ish)

Sever's Corn Maze

Brianne Bilyeu, 645 Comments

On Sunday the Hubby and I went to Sever’s Corn Maze in Shakopee, MN.  The weather was beautiful – sunny with a clear blue sky, and a cool nip in the air to give it that perfect fall feeling.

This is a view of this year’s corn maze, Vikings 50th Season (the Vikings are the MN football team for you non-native, non-sports readers), from the air:

The maze itself is gigantic – it took us about two hours to wander through it and find all 26 of the hidden signposts that were scattered throughout the maze.  That little tan board to the left of the picture above is actually a bridge where probably 40 people or so can stand side-by-side and look out over the maze.

At Sever’s they have pony and camel rides (yes, camels in freaking Minnesota – right der alongside dah corn, eh!).  They’ve got an area where an old-timey band plays and visitors can buy “state fair food” like corn dogs, cheese curds, roasted corn, and fresh-squeezed lemonade.  There’s a petting zoo, a corn “pool”, hayrides, a miniature hay bale maze for the younger kids, a pumpkin patch, magic shows, carnival games and all sorts of other entertainment.

We had a blast.

Sever's Corn Maze

Sever’s Corn Maze

Brianne Bilyeu, 1,355 Comments

On Sunday the Hubby and I went to Sever’s Corn Maze in Shakopee, MN.  The weather was beautiful – sunny with a clear blue sky, and a cool nip in the air to give it that perfect fall feeling.

This is a view of this year’s corn maze, Vikings 50th Season (the Vikings are the MN football team for you non-native, non-sports readers), from the air:

The maze itself is gigantic – it took us about two hours to wander through it and find all 26 of the hidden signposts that were scattered throughout the maze.  That little tan board to the left of the picture above is actually a bridge where probably 40 people or so can stand side-by-side and look out over the maze.

At Sever’s they have pony and camel rides (yes, camels in freaking Minnesota – right der alongside dah corn, eh!).  They’ve got an area where an old-timey band plays and visitors can buy “state fair food” like corn dogs, cheese curds, roasted corn, and fresh-squeezed lemonade.  There’s a petting zoo, a corn “pool”, hayrides, a miniature hay bale maze for the younger kids, a pumpkin patch, magic shows, carnival games and all sorts of other entertainment.

We had a blast.

Sever’s Corn Maze

ValleyScare 2010

Brianne Bilyeu, , , 774 Comments

It’s that time of the year when the Valleyfair amusement park becomes ValleyScare! 

Many of the parks smaller buildings are transformed into haunted houses for ValleyScare.  Their gaudy, brightly-lit displays are switched out for black paint, fake blood, windows covered with black curtains, cottony spider-web gauze.

Spiders, skulls, bats, rats, gargoyles, vampires, devils, pumpkins, ghosts, witches and devilish half-man/half-monster creatures are planted all over the rides and food vending buildings.

The “worst” part of ValleyScare is the hordes of teen actors who are hired to dress up as zombies and monsters to frighten the guests.  They’ll sneek out from behind signs and start dragging metal buckets on the ground behind you, or they’ll lumber over from across the road to block your way.  Or they’ll just walk quietly behind you until you turn around and then moan or yell in your face.  The zombie below had no pretense or guile (that’s zombies for ya) – he just ran full out and screamed at the dude in the hoodie.  Hey, it seemed to work!

Look at the ants on the roof of the taffy shop – ugh!

This turned out to be one of my favorite photos from last night.  ValleyScare has fog machines located all over the park, and this photo captures the dusk lighting through the mist of the fog.  It’s very creepy and empty. 

Because it was Sunday, and because I arrived before the sun had set, the park was empty except for a handful of other patrons and an entire staff of zombie actors.  At many times I was one guest to four or six zombies, which really made the park feel like the end of Zombieland.

Tombestones in front of the tilt-o-whirl.

My favorite ride is the Renegade – it feels like the fastest roller coaster in the park!  Unfortunately, it’s allllll the way in the back of the park, which means I had to run the entire zombie guantlet.  I don’t mind the whole jump-out-and-scare-you thing, and it’s actually fun when I’m with a group of friends, but when I was by myself they’d jump out, I’d shriek, and then there would be this awkward pause where we’d both think, “Okay….we’re two adults standing here, one of us in a silly custume….now what?”, and I would scuttle away to be received by the next monster.  On the way back from the Renegade (yup, it was still awesome!) I cheated and followed close behind a group of three workers in ValleyScare ride operator uniforms so that I wouldn’t be attacked. Zombie camoflage WIN!

ValleyScare 2010

MN State Fair

Brianne Bilyeu, 4,272 Comments

Yesterday I went to the Minnesota State Fair with my little sister, Ashley, from Big Brothers Big Sisters.  We marched in the parade with a bunch of bands and other local groups.  Ashley found one of her friends and the group of us ended up hanging out all day long.

Big Brothers, Big Sisters marches in the 2010 Minnesota State Fair!

Ashley and Gang with the Fresh French Fries mascot

We ate so much food!  Seriously, I could have bought theater tickets for what I spent on food yesterday. Here’s the list of things that the six of us ate throughout the 10-hour day:

  • French fries
  • Deep-fried alligator bites
  • Corn on the cob
  • Tacos
  • Nachos
  • Famous Dave’s BBQ pork sandwich
  • Lemonade, frozen lemonades, lemonade slushies
  • Kettle corn
  • Pretzel with nacho cheese sauce
  • Foot-long corn dog
  • Caramel apple
  • Cherry snow cone
  • Root beer
  • Cheddar cheese curds
  • Ocean Spray pomegranete-blueberry juice
  • Curly fries
  • Pizza

Man!  It was a snacky, nibbling sort of day, and we didn’t all eat everything on the list, but that’s still a lot of food!

The Minnesota State Fair is kind of huge, perhaps bordering on gigantic, and maybe – dare I say? – ginormous.  Click on the picture below for the full-size image.

We did our darndest to see as much as we could!  We visited the Miracle of Birth Center and the Sheep and Poultery barn.  We sat in on the live audience of the KSTP Channel 5 4:30pm newscast with Megan Newquist.  All six of us were on TV (in one of the panning camera shots), and Ashley got Megan’s signature.

Ashley and her friend with KSTP meteorologist Chikage Windler

We walked by the Midway, the Kidway and Adventure Park.  We walked through Machinery Hill and Heritage Square.  We saw the skaters and BMXers at the X-Zone, petted the dogs in the Pet Center and walked through the Grandstand vendors area.  We visited the Eco Experience building and the Fine Arts building.  We rode the open-air Sky Gliders.  And at the end of the night we ran across a cheering crowd singing along with Boyz to Men at the Leine’s stage.

On the Sky Glider – not too bad for two girls who claim to not like heights!

And we had to stop to take pictures at every. One. Of the plywood cutouts we found.

The State Fair continues for the next 12 days.  I’d like to visit at least once more this season in order to see some of the “less exciting” buildings that I missed on account of visiting with a 13 year-old with a short attention span.  Exhibits like the arts and crafts building, the Agriculture and Horticulture building (Arg!  We missed the crop art!  How could we miss crop art?  It’s “Dedicated to the beauty of seeds pasted on a board to make a picture.” One doesn’t just miss seeds pasted on a board to make a picture!), the DNR building, the cattle and swine barns and the International Bazaar.

Ah, you ridiculous food, fun and farm-focused festival.  I love ya.

MN State Fair

MN Renaissance Festival

Brianne Bilyeu, , 2,870 Comments

Weekend Adventures!

This week was the opening of the Minnesota Renaissance Festival.  For those of you who may have never been, there are Renaissance fairs all over the United States and each one has its own flavor.  The MN Ren Fest (or Fair) always takes place in in  Shakopee, MN.  The location has permanent buildings that are used by the same vendors every year.

The front gates of the MN Renaissance Festival

Going to the Ren Fest is like volunteering to be part of a play – you can dress up in costumes, you can speak with a lot of “thees”, “thous” and “thys”, and there is a good chance that you will interact with belly dancers, pirates, royalty, handmaidens and guardsmen, pickle sellers, fairies, peasants, minstrels and troubadours, explorers, merchants, sorcerers and many other types of characters.  Some of them are paid actors, others are just visitors who are getting into the spirit of the fair.

I’ve been to the Fair before, but I’d never gone on opening day.  I couldn’t find anyone to go with me, so I decided to head out by myself.  I drove out to Shakopee, parked and arrived at the gate at about 8:30am.  At about 8:50 actors started climbing up onto the gates.  I knew from past experience that there would be a gate show, usually with the king, queen and their attendants, as well as few rabble-rousers to taunt the royalty and visitors alike.  After the gate show they shoot a cannon to announce the start of the day’s fair and the gates open.   The gate show actually kind of stunk this year; the actors wove and dove through the relatively simple (and cheesy) script, but eventually they reached the end, the gates opened and the fairgoers streamed inside.

Visitors coming into the Ren Fest through the front gates.

Immediately inside the gates felt a lot like that scene from Who Framed Roger Rabbit where Eddie Valiant enters Toon Town for the first time in the movie – it was noisy, crowded and there were actors on all sides singing songs of welcome to the fair.  It was kind of neat, but chaotic.

The Royal Court – Queen and King, center

The fairgrounds are actually quite large, and after the initial rush at the gate people ambled off in different directions and we ended up spread pretty thin.  For the first hour of the fair I had the place largely to myself.  It was very odd because I knew that in an hour, these paths would be packed with people.

At Ren Fest there are comedy shows, magic shows, belly dancing, juggling, wine tastings, cursing exhibitions, jousting, snakes, tortoises, dogs, ferrets, elephants, camels, goats, and usually at least one alligator.

A fairy blows bubbles for the cutest little girl that I saw at the fair all day.

Kick ass giant suits of armor outside of an artisan’s shop

Belly dancers entertaining in one of the festival’s open areas

What can you do with two sticks, some rope, and a bucket of soap?  This woman can make GIGANTIC bubbles.  I also caught one of the roaming flower girl in the back of the photo.

At Ren Fest you can pay to have someone thrown in the stocks, or you can purchase a ticket to have dinner with the queen and king (or both!).  There are approximately eighty billion and elebenty types of food to eat.  A common sight at Ren Fest is people of all stripes ambling along holding a gigantic cooked turkey leg, nibbling at the meat and watching the crowds.

I left fairly early in the morning – 10:30am!  That’s less than two hours inside and I’d bet a personal record for me.  The spaces were so empty that I was able to walk around the fairgrounds twice, and none of the shows I wanted to see started until after noon.  Also, the sun came out and burned off the early morning fog and it started to get really very muggy.  I’ll be headed back to the fair again later in the seven-weekend run with the Hubby and friends and that’s usually an entire day’s trip.  But this trip was unique and I’m glad that I went.

MN Renaissance Festival