While Scott was exploring ( I was working...) California the kids and I were back home. Porch breakfast and planning for our upcoming Washington road trip. Today we had plans to go apple picking and hiking. I packed us a picnic lunch for our day. Meadow had earned some money recently and with her money bought herself a music stand. It arrived today. Then the kids and I drove to Whistling Well Farms to go apple picking. We had been here a couple times in the past few years. 

Meadow and I had a million errands to run on this day. Scott needed trim paint for the garage. Good thing we get the contractor discount at Sherwin Williams. Cause they're super expensive. But are their paints really that much better?    Meadow looked at coats at Goodwill. She didn't like that the sleeves were short on this coat. Agreed.    I love that Goodwill has EV chargers. It seems that no one knows that they are there. We stopped at REI and I liked this 20 degree bag. I don't believe the temperature ratings on these. This is probably good to 40 or 30 degrees. AKA Brooke has major blood circulation issues.   Theo spent the morning playing the Switch, of course. Once he was done gaming, Theo joined us in helping to paint the garage. Scott had all the green done so it was my turn to paint the trim. Don't let them fool you. I painted the rest of the trim. But I suppose the one day they helped sped things up a bit. Break for lunch. The rest of the garage t...

We happened to be driving through Manitowish Waters so figured this was finally my chance to go to Little Bohemia Lodge . Brooke's wanted to go here forever. So why not? Even if you arrive when the restaurant opens, expect to wait. Better yet, make a reservation if you plan on going. Rookie mistake on our part. But I guess it could be worse than hanging at their old school bar with some brewskis and Shirley Temples. There seemed to be a lot of open tables. Sounded like they were understaffed.  Most had went back to school for the season. I did not expect the famed bullet holes to be right next to the tables. There were holes everywhere.

This past year Theo's best friend moved to Owatonna. When we came down last May for his birthday party I saw a sign for the Steele County Fair and knew we had to come back for it. First stop is the lemonade stand.  Then we hit up the daredevil show. After going to the RV show last February, Theo gets excited to tour campers.  They're fun to look at it or rent, but sorry bud, we're sticking to tents for the most part. You know I love a fair that is connected to the historic village.  I don't know if this is a common thing, but a few of the county fairs around here have little history centers right on their fairgrounds.

  I was back in Dallas for a day or so to shoot another college campus. After the shoot I made my way back to Bishop Arts District for some tacos at Taqueria El Si Hay . Of course Scott get sent to the cities you don't want to visit in summer. Hey, I just go where they send me. I should've got some elotes on the side. It was only 98 and humid. Just your typical Dallas summer day. I ended up finding a shady park to eat. There’s a lot, and I mean a ton, of suburban sprawl in Dallas proper. But if you look hard enough there’s some rather large areas of pre-WWII development.

Brooke and I went on a little bike date again to see some more old houses. This time for one of the tours I was most excited for, Lowry Hill.  We started with a history of the Walker Art Museum.  This house was built for the architect Frank B. Long of the notable architects Long and Kees. That's quite the roof.  Long wouldn't recognize the view from his home. These houses are bit fancy for my taste, but I learned some Minneapolis history along the way. It seemed like on this tour we had to stop at every house on Mount Curve Avenue.