Another Minneapolis-St. Paul Home Tour, Tour

This is the first year since we started going on the Home Tours that I had a Saturday off. Saturday's are better because there's more time to see everything you want. We ate a quick breakfast of granola.

We started by heading to a cute craftsmen home in the tangletown in our neighborhood, Jordan.

The downstairs was craftsman while the upstairs had art deco features.

The house was converted to an up-down duplex at some point.

Then we saw a few Victorians on Fremont in Old Highland.

This house had so many coats of paint.

Meadow's favorite parts were the stairs.

The next house had an awesome arch.

They will be taking off the siding this summer to reveal the original clapboard.

The next house was the one I was most excited to see. It was originally built for the Donaldson's that owned a giant department store in downtown Minneapolis.

That department store turned into a regional powerhouse that lasted until 1987.

 The current owners did a really good job restoring the home. Some of the rooms were designed by John Bradstreet who also did parts of the Glensheen in Duluth.

The owners who lived here in the 70's sold a lot of the homes original details. Including the dining room chandelier which sold to Barbara Striesand for $17,000. They bought back as much as they could, but not the chandelier.

You know you have money when you tile the ceiling.

I love when tile goes up so high.

The only downfall of this home is the constant roar of I-394.

Next we headed over to St Paul to see the Schmidt Artist Lofts.

This was developed by the same company doing the A-Mill Artist Lofts that we nearly moved into.

I would love the opportunity to sell my prints at events like the St. Paul Art Crawl.

I think we could handle this for a few years, but I might miss working on the house.

Last we saw a cluster of homes in the Dayton's Bluff neighborhood of St. Paul.

We've never really explored this area, but have always heard about its plethora of cheap, old homes.

The last house we saw was one of my favorites. I usually like to see old homes brought back to their original glory. I hate to see woodwork painted white, but this house mixed old with new in a really awesome way.

Perhaps a bit too much beige paint for my taste.

I don't think I could handle that paint job.

There was a little reading nook in the top turret. Meadow and I loved that part.

We actually really enjoyed this neighborhood and wouldn't mind living here.

Could get used to that view of downtown St. Paul.

We missed lunch and ate leftover sweet potato ravioli instead of making something.

Meadow wanted to play outside after dinner. We really need a sandbox.

Meadow loves to be outside. She would stay out here all day if she could. In a way it's kind of worked out for us because we are actually getting gardening done ahead of time this year.

Scott found this while tilling the garden. My dad thinks it was crank for a window.

This is Meadow when it's time to go back in.

She'd sleep outside if we let her.

She's going to love camping and going to the cottage this summer.

Give the girl a bath and some popcorn and she will forget all about having to come inside.