I had to travel to St. Croix Falls over in Wisconsin and then all the way across Minnesota in Fergus Falls to shoot a couple of hotels. After my second hotel shoot I stopped by Dairyland before heading home. This was the correct choice. I even got a little tour of the place from the owner. Pretty cool to see the old radio switch board from when they were a proper drive-in.

I had a job back up in Park Rapids, Minnesota, so we made a weekend out of it. As we tend to do we stopped at Revel Brewing for beer, kombucha, root beer and pizza. We got the small pizza on accident, but it would do. Looking back from previous times we've been here the pizzas used to be bigger.  I think we just ordered the larges in the past. My bad. This year Theo has suddenly discovered he likes reading. When he finds a book he wants at the bookstore we have to say yes. 

We were going to just go overnight on Saturday with Scott for a work trip. With a snowstorm in the forecast we left right after the kids were done with school. Meadow is still chugging away at her rug hooking.    We stopped at the China Star buffet near St Cloud. They really upgraded the interior since we were here last.  Don't worry about me. Just noshing on the green beans. Can a guy get more veggies in these buffets? We ended up changing hotels and staying in Walker at the... Walker Hotel . The room was a bit old fashioned and TV a wee one. But the pool had a slide, so that's a win. Right? The falling snow outside the pool window made it slightly magical. 

  Another weekend, another road trip. This time to the North Shore. We made a pit stop on the way to Duluth at Rush City Bakery.  Grand Marais Best Western this time. Sweet. Blake showing off his garden. When I asked Blake if we could stay at his house on the way to Grand Marais he mentioned there was going to be a poetry reading that night. I thought we wouldn't participate until we found out there would be a dunk tank involved.  It sounded lame. But it was once again a Duluth counterculture classic. Only Meadow was bored. But when is she not these days?

Scott had a job in Moorhead. You know what that means, road trip!  I had to get a photo of Theo being sweet holding his Baby.  We stayed the night at a Best Western. I've been photographing a lot of these and they're all pretty dang nice. We spent the night swimming in their small waterpark.  I looked up the best playground in Fargo and found Maplewood Park.  Meanwhile I shot the Minnesota State - Moorhead campus. What was even better was that it had a ninja warrior course too. Mexico City has adult "playgrounds" next to all the kids playgrounds and I wish we had more of that here.  We had small ones all along the Oak Leaf Trail in Milwaukee County. Not sure what Minneapolis' deal is. This was harder to do than it looked. The kids were much better at it than me. I've really gotten out of shape over the years.  She says this, but she still looks great.

Day 1 Normally Scott does his annual New York Mills trip the last week of school, but this year it got pushed to the week after.  That meant the family could tag along. We returned to Spirit Lake Resort & Motel in Menahga. Nice rooms, super affordable and now home to a sweet ice cream shop. I read that there was a playground next door. I guess this was it.  Come on you got a beautiful private beach right next to the bigger city one. They have way more fun by water anyway. 

Thank goodness Meadow had her last day of school and Scott had some work up north. We got out of the boring house and tagged along with him. On Tuesday night I had worked in New York Mills for my annual Lund boat shoot. I stayed at Menahga's Spirit Lake Motel and Resort as a change of pace. When I returned I finally confirmed that I'd be shooting on Friday in Park Rapids just up the road from Menahga. After debating whether to camp we decided to just stay at the Sprit Lake Motel since we'd be arriving late at night. In the morning Theo was ready to take pictures with one of our old cameras. We had first breakfast at the local bakery. Chocker's Bakery . Comes highly recommended from, well, all of us. Meadow approves. We all approve. Scott had to work so us kids explored Park Rapids. Who knew Park Rapids was the Wild West? In all seriousness, I came up to photograph the Jeweler of the North . They'd recently moved from their old location up on the North Shore. After h...

Another June means another visit to Detroit Lakes while I work at nearby New York Mills' Lund Factory. We arrived late, but that didn't stop us from taking a walk down Lake Drive.  Because of the teacher strike back in March, Meadow is actually still in school. We pulled her out for a few days so we could come along too.    I had to wake up early the next morning for my shoot back in New York Mills. We stayed at the same cute motel we stayed in last year. While Scott worked, the kids and I walked to downtown. Last year Scott took the kids downtown while I worked. I hadn't been there yet.  After going last year, the kids wanted to go back to the Toy Finder store. It's a store full of discontinued toys. I was excited to find an old Battleship game. I hate the new ones that make noise. I had been looking for the same style I had growing up.  I also got a travel Guess Who. Meadow chose a small Brewers hat with baseball cards and Theo picked out an oil truck.   ...

Since we were up this way why wouldn't we venture into Canada? Scott and I have enhanced drivers licenses. That means we can cross the border without a passport. We were allowed to bring birth certificates for the kids.

Way back in January I got an email from the owner of the AmericInn up in Roseau, Minnesota. He had won my silent auction entry at the Explore Minnesota Tourism Conference. Seven months later we were set to come up and shoot the hotel and around town for Go & Explore Roseau . Meadow has been begging to go to McDonalds. "But I've only been there once" she'd say. I finally caved on our drive to Roseau.