My last weekend as a Minnesota suburbanite was just about as perfect as it could possibly have been. I've been going nonstop lately, and it was so nice to be able to step back and do a ton of really enjoyable things with people I love before diving right back into the cycle of straight-up craziness today!
On Friday, Andrew and Alyssa kindly invited Stu and me to be their guests for a private party hosted by Yelp at the Cowles Center. We met up early for cocktails on Union's roof and took advantage of the gorgeous evening...probably one of the last patio nights of the summer! The party was super fun--a ton of Twin Cities restaurants, bars, breweries and businesses offered samples of and discounts on their products. Particular favorites? The cutie working the Tin Whiskers Brewery's booth, and the photo booth that produced these pictures:
Yep. Pretty cute, right?
Saturday piqued my passion for all things house-and-design in a big way. My mom and I started off the morning with manicures at the lovely A La Mode, where I legitimately adore everyone and have never been unhappy with a mani...this time I went with classic red, and I'm loving it! We headed over to the Bachman's on Lyndale for the Fall 2014 Ideas House, where Bachman's designers use their florals and homewares to decorate a darling 1920s two-story home from top to bottom for the season. Look how cute this "Book Club" table setting was!
Then Kelsie and I headed out, armed with cold presses, to hit up some million-dollar homes on the last weekend of the Parade of Homes! We checked out three of them...one gorgeous one with views of both Lake Calhoun and Lake of the Isles, one super-modern one in Edina, and this beauty:
Um, yes. This is the porch: THE PORCH...
Sign me up. I'd sit out there even in negative forty-degree weather. With eight thousand square feet, a closet that was so big it had stairs, a full gym and half-basketball court in the basement, and three full bars (one on each floor, naturally), I pretty much wanted to move in right then and there. Off to find a husband to make me a trophy wife, stat!
And we hit up the Bulldog for dinner and sat outside and watched a cholo parade. I'm not kidding...genuinely about 20 pimped-out cars. It was a delightful night with my favorite dear old friend, and the perfect way to close out this suburban chapter of my life.
And Sunday!! My mom and I took my grandma, who is one of my top 5 favorite people in the world, to the Minnesota Orchestra to see a performance of Barber's cello concerto and Mahler's Second Symphony...the "Resurrection" symphony. And this was our view:
Front row seats. We had a perfect view of cello virtuoso Alisa Weilerstein, who absolutely dominated the Barber so hard she finished the performance actually dripping sweat, and of course I had an unobstructed sight line to Osmo Vänskä, my very favorite Finn. The Mahler utterly blew my mind--our seats were almost too close for a full, full orchestra, plus the Minnesota Chorale, plus amazing soprano and mezzo soloists. It was lush, it was evocative, it was intensely powerful. I clapped so hard at the end that my hands glowed pink half the way home!
We "kidnapped" my grandma and drove her down to Lakeville after the show for one last grill-out. The day, sunny and 75, couldn't have been more perfect for burgers, salad, and of course a gin and tonic...but capping it off with Mom's to-die-for pear and apple crisp definitely felt like fall!
Now I'm ready to check out of summer: bring on cardigans, pumpkins, changing leaves, and chilly breezes. My last summer weekend more than met expectations!