New Hobby

I think I found a new hobby: visiting wineries! Recently I found myself sipping "juice" at 2 more wineries.

Cedar Creek Winery
Location: Cedarburg, WI

It had been awhile since I had visited a winery and actually gone on the tour. I usually just belly up to the tasting bar and get right to the goods, but we had the time and figured, why not!? So glad we did! Sure I heard a lot of the same stuff and saw a lot of the same stuff, but I also learned a lot of new stuff and partook in a lot of new stuff! For instance, I learned what "Estate" means when you see it on the bottle. All this time I thought it meant something like "reserve" - like it was a higher quality or something. Not necessarily... it really just means that the producer of the wine owns both the winery and the vineyard and everything was done in-house.

I also learned that "oak aged" can mean the wine maker put oak chips in the fermenting tank -- a much cheaper method. So you want to look for "aged in oak barrels" if you really care about such things.

The last highlight: trilling. This was tricky, I nearly drown. :) We were instructed to "slurp" the wine - so inhaling and aerating the wine to release flavor and aromas. Without exhaling we were swallow the wine, then exhale. I found it really hard to swallow without exhaling or exhaling while swallowing, hence the drowning. However, if you could manage it, it was an interesting to taste and taste the smell of the wine.

Right now I might be declaring Cedar Creek Winery my favorite upper mid-west winery!


Door Peninsula Winery
Location: Carlsville, WI (Door County)

Door County itself was a treat to visit. I hard heard so much so I am glad I got to see it for myself. I was glad to see the highway wasn't lined with tourist shops filled with tacky t-shirts. However, I can't say I thought it was anymore charming than parts of Upper MN (but I am bias).

Again I was fooled, the advertisement for the winery said: located in a historic schoolhouse. Just like the winery in Lake Lillian, MN - it was not a cute one room schoolhouse that I envisioned in my head. It was huge inside! And they have nearly 40 different wines. Free tastings of almost all of them, so you need to be careful!

They have some great novelty wine, for instance I got a mulled Christmas wine that I am excited to try in a few months!

Pet Cemetery

I didn't think something could be tucked away right next to a freeway, but this cemetery does a good job of hiding! I had heard rumors of a pet cemetery in MN, but until I saw it with my own eyes, I wasn't going to believe it. Turns out it is true! Several U-turns were made, the same residential homes passed by time and time again and a thorough search for the cemetery on the grounds of the Humane Society in St Paul and I was losing hope. But we finally stumbled upon and I couldn't believe it! It was huge! Thousands of animals are buried here!

It is truly remarkable. You will see markers that must have cost thousands of dollars and even a beloved hedgehog found its final resting place here. Sadly, they are no longer accepting new burials.

Street Address: 694 Cope Avenue, Roseville, MN

Animal Humane Society site: http://www.animalhumanesociety.org/services/lossofpet/cemetery

My bonus wine trip: July 18-19, 2009

Travel Log

I cheated on my Wine Club co-members and took a summer wine trip without them! I hope they forgive me. But I couldn't pass up the opportunity to spend a relaxing weekend at a co-worker's home in the quaint town of Lindstrom, MN.

Once I arrived at my co-workers home nestled in 80 acres of tree filled land we headed right out for our first tasting at Chateau St Croix. Located just over the MN border and in St Croix Falls, WI we saw the chateau, perched in the midst of green farming lands. The vines and grapes are still too young to produce bottle quality juice so in the mean time they are getting grapes mailed from California. I am excited for the Northern wines they will eventually produce, but until then, they have a few bottles that will occupy my wine rack!

Next stop was Trade River Winery and presumably the smallest wine tasting room in the state! We let the crowd of tasters finish up before starting ourselves and wandered on the beautiful grounds for a few minutes. This winery, located in Grantsburg, WI, is an interesting supplier of boutique wines shipped in from Argentina. They have 3 different tasting lists: red wines of Argentina, white wines of Argentina and Trade River wines of Argentina. They have no vines on their property, but instead grow in Argentina. I sampled from the Trade River tasting sheet, next time I think I will try a different tasting sheet and bring a picnic to soak in the charming landscape!
After all the tasting, we were starved. Headed back to Lindstrom, we stopped in Center City, MN to gorge at Eichten's Bistro & Market. And wow, did we gorge! Great food in a cute little smalltown bistro.

Before heading home on Sunday, we made 1 more tasting stop at WineHaven Vineyard in Chisago City, MN. This was the traditional MN vineyard I was use to! Several red and white wines produced from grapes developed by the U of MN, plus fruit wine. For the first time I think I found a fruit wine I liked! Cranberry. So tart, yet refreshing - yum.

Weekend over - and then I had to go home and mow. Sigh. If only Midwest wine tastings could be my life!

~posted by Ann

My SW MN Wine Trip, May 22-May24, 2009

Second Annual MN Wine Trip!

This year the area of focus was Southwest MN, an area I haven't spent much time in. The itinerary held 6 wineries and 1 brewery for us lushes. Before all this drinking, we had better start with full stomachs! So that brought us to Blackbird Cafe. Love it! Wonderful dishes and fun atmosphere. Ok, now we were ready - bring on the wine! First stop, Crofut Winery, only 45 minutes away. Well... I thought it was the first stop until someone actually read the itinerary I made up and it clearly says: Open Saturday and Sunday. Um, it was Friday. DOH! I had ruined everything! :) Thankfully it was spotted in enough time and we could easily redirect and head straight to New Ulm and Morgan Creek Winery. Oh, little tangent here... you know why I love road trips? Cuz you stumble upon cute little towns that you would never see or visit otherwise. Like, Henderson. Adorable. Totally looks like it frozen in the 1950s. We had to explore and do a bit of antiquing.

The drive to Morgan Creek Winery was just one of my favorites. Once you leave the city of New Ulm you travel on lonely country roads and pass by farms where cows linger under trees and near shaded creeks. The final turn even brings you onto a gravel road. The grounds were just lovely, with a nice large patio out back with chairs and a fire pit. The thing that surprised me the most during the tasting - the wine was good! I know, people wonder why I do this wine trip sometimes because, well, MN does not have good wine. We have lots of fruit wine, cuz that is what grows - apples and strawberries. But lately the University of MN has been producing really hardy grapes and I think Morgan Creek is finally benefiting from such engineering. Their wine was at a level of sophistication that I haven't found in MN before. They say the first 100 years are the toughest in wine production - I think once these U of MN grapes really mature then we will be noticing more and more decent wine from the land of 10,000 lakes. Morgan Creek also serves appetizers, which provided us with a great excuse to buy a bottle of wine or two and sit outside, enjoying the spring sun.


We thought we would explore New Ulm for a bit - turns out it is like all the small towns of the world and it pretty much shuts down at 6pm. So it was mostly just window shopping for us and compiling a list of places we could eat at. Ignoring the advice of the winemaker, we sought out the most German looking place - Kaiserhoff. I don't think any of us regretted it. Of course there were no vegetarian options, but I like salads! Even if it comes with like 8 slices of American cheese. The deep fried sauerkraut balls were a hit! After dinner we had the pleasure of retiring to our humble abode for the night: Super 8. And boy do I mean humble. It worked for the evening though! An air mattress and a sleeping bag were all we needed to make the cozy accommodation even more cozy.

After slyly heading down to the continental breakfast in shifts, we had time to really shop in downtown before our 1pm Schell's brewery tour. We were determined to squeeze in every highlight in New Ulm that we could and then meant, after our shopping spree, we had to visit Herman. For some reason I still don't know who Herman actually is (the information will not stick in my head), but they have a monument of him and for $1.50 you can climb to the top. I mean, how can you not spend the $1.50? After signing a waiver dissolving the park of any liability (um, ok) Pam and I raced up the stairs. My thighs burned but I was going to concur Herman! Triumph! Once on top I got to experience some stunning views!


We could now move onto the Schell Brewery. This was my second time there, I wish it was my second home. The whole compound is lovely and has such history. The tour lasts about a half hour and then we get to visit the basement pub and partake in a generous sampling of beer. We were on a schedule so we couldn't linger all that long. We had to get on the road and get our focus back on wine, next stop: Fieldstone Vineyards in Morgan. Very cute mom and pop winery. The owner was there running the tasting, with his wife for extra help and their kids were out back playing. They even had wine called "The Wine-ing Farmer" and "The Wine-ing Farmer's Wife" - it was cute. They were very sweet. They were also very helpful in getting us to the next stop: Olde Country Vineyard in Lake Lillian.

So I had heard this winery was in an old school. I guess I took that to mean old schoolhouse - like those old one room schoolhouses you see. Well no, this was in a 1954's building, looking very similar to my intermediate school. I was getting so use to the cute that I wasn't ready for that. However, the owner's wife that was running the tour - well, I think she is the sweetest woman alive. They had the most wines I have ever seen, I don't know if I even got through half of them. It was mostly all fruit wines and with this being my third tasting stop this day I had reached my limit.


We needed to get to our hotel for the night: Spicer Castle. I heard about this hotel because they host Murder Mystery Dinners on the weekend. Something I have always wanted to do, but we were not going to arrive on time, plus I don't know if I could have gotten the other girls in my group onboard! We checked in quick and then headed out for dinner. We were told to head to Melvyn's on the Lake as I think everyone else in the state of MN was told to do also. When we got there we were warned that we could take a table outside, but that the wait on food was pushing 1 hour. Wow - not use to hearing that in small town MN! Oh well, at least they could get us drink and we had the lake to look at. This area is very much like Up North - tons of lakes. We returned to the Castle for spa night and then settled in for a good night's rest. The next morning we were treated to a three course breakfast while the owner regaled us with stories of the Inn and of the town.

The next winery was right in Spicer. We thought we would check-out a bit early so we could see the Main street and then head over for our tasting. Um, Spicer has no Main street. There is one antique store and it didn't open til noon! Oh well, we bummed around for a bit - it isn't that hard to find ways to waste time! Time to taste at Glacial Ridge Winery. The owner was celebrating his birthday and had cake for all his visitors. Yummy! Ok, time to head home and stop at our final winery: Woodland Hill Winery. Truth be told, I have been here before (it is right by the best orchard in the world, Fall Harvest Orchard) and I clearly remembered the apple wines still! It was another beautiful day so we got to sit outside and enjoy some live music and just relax.

Biggest lesson learned from this trip: Bring some snacks for the wine tastings. Not all of the wineries provide a way to cleanse your pallet and sometimes water (if you can even find that) is not enough.

~posted by Ann

My Florida Keys Trip: May 17-21, 2009

Travel Log

I was lucky enough to attend another out of state conference for work this year so I decided to do what I did last year and mix a little business with pleasure. It was actually a super interesting conference, but all the same, I was happy for Sunday to arrive and my vacation could start! Turn off the nerd side of the brain and just chill. I met Michelle and Rachel at the Miami airport mid-afternoon; the temp was maybe 80 but felt like 120. That humidity really sucks any life out of you, it is amazing to be standing, in shade, and just sweating. We hopped the shuttle to the rental car location and cozied up to a kiosk to slickly check-in and get our car voucher. We were then told to walk to the "mid-size" car corral and pick any mid-size in the lot. There was one lone car left, but it was shiny and white and held our luggage so it was a perfect fit! (keep that in mind, more about the car later) Then off we go to SoBe.

We found the Ocean Five Hotel with no problem. The hotels in SoBe are old and tired so you never know what you are going to get when you are looking in my price range. This hotel was fine -- not sure I would want to stay more than 1 night, but it worked for what we needed it to. However, the TV didn't work, the air conditioner was like a airplane and the bathroom was the size of my kitchen pantry. But like I said, it worked for the night.

After checking in, we headed off to find food. Ocean Drive is an interesting place. Lots of people and lots of vultures. Most restaurants have hostesses that try to get you to stop by sharing their "best" deals. We fell for it - half priced food, free glass of wine and 2 for 1 drinks. Worst pizza I had, but great deal on drinks! After dinner we had to get our feet wet so headed to the beach for a stroll.


The next morning, after having a little continental breakfast at the hotel we packed up the car and headed to the Keys. Once we rolled into Key Largo, I stopped the car at the Visitor Center. It is pretty rare for me to do that, but last time I was at the Keys we did that and got some good tips. Bob (or was it Jim?), the Visitor Center worker helped us with a great lunch tip and snorkel outfit. Ah...The Big Chill and Key West Ale. The Big Chill was probably on the same level as say Champp's, but it sure didn't have Champp's view! I quickly became use to deck eating and staring at the water. Sadly I didn't appreciate Key West Ale as much as I should have, I can't find a distributor back here! Such the perfect beer for an excessively hot day.


After full tummies we left to find our snorkel shop and head out to open water. We went through, http://www.snorkelingisfun.com/reefs.htm, which brought us to Garret's Reef in Pennekamp State Park. Sadly, the snorkeling wasn't the highlight that I wanted it to be. I got pretty nauseous on the boat (and in the choppy water), it was cloudy so the coral didn't really pop and my brand new snorkel I bought did not block the rush of salt water directly into my mouth. However, maybe once I get my underwater pics developed I will remember it differently. After snorkeling we remained on the benches for a bit til I could get my land legs and the captain of the boat asked us,"is that your MN tags" and pointed to the parking lot. After stuttering and much blonde-like confusion we said we are from MN, but have a rental car. After he left we ran to the rental car only to see MN license plates staring back at us. WHAT!? We were in FLORIDA! We rented a car in FL! It only took us 2 days to figure it out.


Onward to Key Colony Beach where our next hotel waited for us: Ocean Beach Club Resort. So in retrospect, it might have been more exciting to stay right in the heart of Key West, but the nice thing about Key Colony Beach was that it was out of the way (off of Hwy 1) and our resort did have a private beach area. For all the water that surrounded us it was like a sick joke that our shower produced no more than a sprinkle of water. Although visiting with the check-in guy made everything all better. :) For our first night he recommended The Island. It was great, I think we hung out for hours - of course at one point we were scared to leave because of the massive rain storm.


The next morning we had breakfast at the restaurant next door - it was nice! Beautiful view and our gay waiter was adorable. After breakfast we had a little walk and then thought we would try some beach time. Nature wasn't that cooperative. The rain clouds moved in so back to the room to change and get a pedi. Well, I had to get a mani since earlier in the week I had tore up my feet from (cute) sandals. After getting pampered for an hour we needed a break so we took a nap and then we were ready for dinner. A recommendation for sushi sent us to Castaways. The worst view ever - especially considering what we had gotten use to, but the food was good even though we had to sit next to a refrigerator truck.

Last day in the Keys are we were going to do it up big and travel to Key West. I really barely remember it - I was so hungry and so overheated I don't know where I was. I think we went to Hemingway's House and saw his poor cats also nearly past out from the heat. We did some shopping, but it was more tourist/tacky shops then my last trip there. We ended the evening with dinner on another deck staring at the water and watching the storm (that would ultimately cancel the Sunset Celebration for that evening) roll in.


So after sweating through all my clothes, I was ready to head home, oh but no, Northwest had different plans for me. The airline thought it would be fun if I got drunk at the Budweiser Brew House and waited 3 1/2 hours til I could board the plane. Not cool. Especially since I had a MN Wine Trip to repack for...

High Tech

I am living in a high tech world I realize and sometimes I grudgingly accept it. Recently, two things have come to my attention and I thought there wasn't enough places out there that mentioned it so I wanted to share...

How can I connect my computer to my TV?
Yes, I have cable and yes, I have a DVR. However, that doesn't mean that I still get to watch as much as TV as I really want so I have now developed a strong relationship with Hulu.com. I hate to cheat on my TV and watch shows on the internet, but it is so easy! Actually, because of ease of watching TV shows on the internet, I know a person that dropped their cable service entirely! For me, I am only bugged by 2 disadvantages:

1. I actually have to watch commercials. There is no skipping through commercials on Hulu, however, I have noticed that the volume will drop when a forced commercial starts so at least I don't have to listen to it at normal listening level. Plus it is just one commercial that lasts at the most 90 seconds. I can handle 90 seconds.

2. My laptop will get heavy and hot on my lap! Which finally brings us to the answer to the question: how can I view Internet TV on my actual TV? The answer - a VGA cable. Just a cable, that is all you need! This cable connects to my monitor output on my laptop and the VGA connection on my TV (note: I believe only HDTVs have this VGA output). Oh and then once you connect you can save on your laptop screen by switching to an external display. For my Dell that means I hit the Fn key plus the key that has the picture of a monitor on it (F8) at the same time. If I hit that sequence once the picture is displayed both on my TV and laptop, if I hit it again the picture is only displayed on my TV.

Now, there is the issue of sound... this VGA cable is for picture only. So the sound is still coming out of my laptop. Which, yes, that is annoying, but I figure I could get better speakers for the laptop or get a sound cable to output the sound from the TV. I haven't tried either option yet.

I got my VGA cable on clearance for $25 (I notice most run about $40-$50).


Roku
I am a little ashamed to admit I first heard about this through my 60-some year old co-worker. I personally haven't tried it myself, but stay tuned, cuz I think I am going to have to get me one! I am a NetFlix.com subscriber, but constantly feel like I am wasting away my membership because I am not using the "Instant Movie" feature. The thousands of "free" movies we have access to and play on the computer at anytime we choose. I have been meaning to do it ever since I got the VGA cable, but for some reason a 2 hour movie sounds like such a bigger commitment than watching a 50 minute TV show via the VGA cable.

So this tiny device streams Netflix movies directly to your TV. The Roku connects to your TV just like a DVD player would. It also needs to connect to the Internet - if you are wireless, it does have Wi-Fi built in. You access Netflix's site on your computer and fill up your instant queue with all the movies you would want to watch. Then, this device comes with a remote that you use to access your Instant Queue on your TV and you make your selection. And viola - you are watching your movie! The remote also allows you to pause, rewind or anything you would do with a DVD. So you can think of this Roku device as a digital DVD player, really. And it is only $99!

~Posted by Ann

Recycle the campaign yard signs

Here's how to recycle those campaign signs...

Pulled from: EcoMetro Editors
Tuesday, November 4, 2008 04:12 PM

If you have a political sign in your yard, you're probably wondering what to do with it right about now. Depending on whether your signs are are plastic, metal, wood, or corrugated plastic commonly called coroplast, there may be a special collection pickup or drop off location near you. Visit the GreenGuardian.com for individual county instructions. Call the hotlines or visit the sites for Hennepin (612-348-3777) and Ramsey (651-266-1199) counties.

Obama supporters can put materials up for free at ObamaCycle to be claimed by another user.