Winter Break Road Trip - Florida part 1

We spent 4 days in Florida's "Treasure Coast" where my grandparents and aunt's family live. Day one the weather was a bit chilly. The rest of the days were great! We hung out at the beach, the pool, did some shopping - general relaxing activities :)



In downtown Stuart

Seafood Omelette and Pigs in a Blanket at the Captain's Galley was aweeeesommmme

Taylor and Dylan hanging on their personal island

Sherri suffering through the "cold" weather on Hutchinson Island

Homemade cotton candy has a surprising large learning curve

Fort Pierce Inlet State Park

Ryan was brave enough to swim in the cold water. I was definitely not.

Observing manatees at the Manatee Observation Center

Winter Break Road Trip Continues

We'll see how this post goes - my internet keeps cutting out and I lose it. No good Charter, no good!

Along with internet issues, this semester started out NUTS. I wasn't expecting that. Between the normal getting back from vacation fun, gathering everything for class, mandatory mock interviews and a case competition I'm beat. This does not bode well for the rest of the semester...

Anyway, back to the trip!  There was a huge backup on I-65 south of Louisville. Gas station rumor was that there was a series of accidents caused by the first one - you know how these things go. After sitting on the highway for an hour we made it to an exit which just so happened to be the home of Ryan's second true love (after Aaron Rodgers of course) Jim Beam, or more specifically Red Stag. They may or may not be common law at this point. The air literally smelled like bourbon, it was unreal. The tours were over but the tasting room was still open! They had a lot of informative signs around the grounds so it wasn't all drinks, there was some learning too. Promise.

We made it into Nashville late and went out to a few bars on Broadway to see some music. It was hard to decide where to go, pretty much everywhere has an act playing. Each one that we decided on was fantastic, we could have spent a few more days there. Definitely a return-to spot!

Day two: drove through Franklin, TN which has a very cute downtown area and nice shops. This classiness was followed up by Time Magazine's number 1 roadside attraction in Cullman, AL: Ave Maria Grotto. Short version is that a monk who lived there made 125 miniatures of various buildings and shrines from around the world, and they were all placed on this hillside for people to visit. Despite the cold, it.was.glorious. Some examples are St. Peter's Square (naturally), the Gardens of Babylon, and the grotto pictured below. It's very easy to get to and highly recommended if you're in the area and amused by this type of thing. They've been maintained very well and the detail is fascinating.

Stopped briefly to see the sun set over Birmingham.

Last stop of the night was Montgomery, AL. The most... interesting/surprising/inspiring? I'm not entirely sure what word to use honestly... thing was just how close MLK's church and the organization of the bus boycott was to the state capitol building. Maybe this is something I was supposed to know but actually seeing it was impressive.

Also sobering was the Civil Rights Memorial. It was designed beautifully with names and dates of those who died during the movement along with important legal events. It was an excellent reminder of what people in this country went through not that long ago. I can't even imagine what life had been like at that time or the courage it took to stand up for their rights.

Day 3 coming soon! (provided my internet holds out)

Roadtrip - Lunch in Louisville

It was originally supposed to be breakfast, which is how I selected Lynn's Paradise Cafe as our destination. (The internet says good things.) Something about the color explosion and giant statue action took all others out of the running no matter what meal of the day was to be had.

I was not disappointed! There was the right amount of bright glitz - not too overwhelming and "everywhere" but still a lot to look at. Plus our table had activities which was amusing enough, but would have been even better with kids. Lunch was good - curry chicken salad and cheesy grit - and the coffees about gave me a heart attack from sugar overload. Delicious!

The rest of Louisville was "eh" which could be accurate or just because it was raining. Hard to tell.

Roadtrip - the beginning

I loaded up my car and was ready to go when wouldn't you know it, my car wouldn't start. A perfect beginning to a week and a half long road trip! Thus, this is the first pic of the trip; the Goodyear at which I had it fixed. It didn't turn out to be anything difficult or serious so it didn't delay us overall. (I was very grateful for that!) Many thanks to Claire for helping me fail at pushing the car from its parking spot to jump it, eventually finding the right neighbor to move their car so we could try and jump it, attempting the jump start though it failed miserably, and hanging out while they fixed it! I hope someone randomly walked by and got a pic of us in the dirt pushing between the car and the restaurant wall. I'll bet it was ridiculously amusing to watch :)

v2.0.2

New York, New York!

In July I took a solo trip to NYC to see the Alexander McQueen exhibit at the Met. It.Was.Amazing. But more on that in a bit.

Day one as planned I wandered around Central Park until I could check into the hotel. Unplanned was the 100 degree temperature. Holy moly was it hot! But a really fantastic walk anyway. I'd been to NYC a couple of times before but hadn't spent much time in Central Park. It was enjoyable seeing so many people out having fun for the day!

Day 2 I visited some of the standard sights like Rockefeller Center, Times Square and China Town where I completed NYC goal number 2 - find dim sum! I hadn't had it in ages; as far as I know the closes places to Appleton that serve it are Chicago or Minneapolis, and knew there were quite a few options available. I settled on Vegetarian Dim Sum House because it had good reviews. They were accurate. It was everything I'd hoped for and, as is required, I ordered WAY too much. It's too hard to choose.

Lunch, dinner and snack!



The third and final day was finally Met day! The first order of business was to get in line for the McQueen exhibit. For 2 hours. There were quite a few times that I thought "this had better be worth it." It absolutely was! The downside was that it was very crowded as the space was small for the number of attendees (they didn't allow photos. I should have taken one anyway, it was nuts). Obviously the tight quarters took away from the enjoyment a bit, but the clothing on display was exquisite. Very hard to describe really... photos don't do the pieces justice, especially the black feather ones, and being able to see them in person was an incredible experience. It makes me wish I was able to make, well, anything :) (ok I made some pj pants once that turned out alright-ish)

After the McQueen show I wandered the museum a bit before having to sit on the LaGuardia tarmac for 3 hours then fly home. I found this "aquamanile"/unicorn water vessel that I feel the need to own. If anyone sees one floating around let me know!

I want oneeeeeeee



Harry Potter poster display in the subway!

Expelliarmus!