Mom memorial

Some very dear friends donated to the Minneapolis Parks for a memorial tree for my mom. The tree was planted last week and today I met the memorials coordinator to place the plaque.

It is a Kentucky Coffee tree situated near a bench at Lake Calhoun with a view of downtown Minneapolis.

The tree with medallion, bench and Lake Calhoun

Refreshing the floors

What you are seeing in the photo is the dining room floor where the left side has been treated with lemon oil and the right side has not.

My hardwood floors are not finished with polyurethane. I used to clean and wax the floors with Bruce's Floor Cleaner and Wax at least once a year. That was a long time ago.

The floors were getting desperately dirty so I mopped with one of the those wet clean mopping systems. I know you aren't supposed to use wet mops on wood floors but those disposable system mop heads have very little liquid so work well to get the dirt without saturating the wood. It picked up the dirt but left the floors dried and with various stains and rings.

I used a dry floor sweeping mop to apply a lemon oil product to the hardwood. The lemon oil takes care of many of the rings and some of the stains.

The floor definitely looks darker but also looks more consistent and refreshed. Apparently the lemon oil will only refresh the floors for a few days. We'll see.

Update: It has been a couple of weeks and the floors still look great.

Spring Green, Wisconsin

I joined the annual trip to Spring Green, Wisconsin again this year. I picked up Rose and we headed to St. Paul to get Dave. We stopped to get coffee before driving to JT and Linda's in Burnsville. We transferred to the Taylor vehicle and drove to the Buckboard in Lakeville for breakfast.

Since we were already south of the Twin Cities and Burnsted's is no longer, we took a southerly route to Spring Green. We were all surprised by how much fall color there was. It was really pretty all along the route. We stopped at a nice rest stop on Interstate 90 west of the Wisconsin border. It had an incredible overlook.

We made good time and met Megan and Michael at the Spring Valley Inn in Spring Green. The hotel no longer serves dinner so we went to Freddie's in Spring Green. The restaurant was a bank at one time. We were sat in the vault. Good food and good friends.

Saturday morning I got in an almost 6 mile run of the flattest land ever. A little pool time then breakfast at The General Store, of course. Dave had a good idea to go to Tower State Park instead of shopping. Dave, JT and I went to the state park which was just a mile from the hotel. It was warm and humid but such an interesting site. Lead buckshot was made using a hand carved hole and tunnel in the limestone.

Saturday night we attended Pericles, King of Tyre at American Players Theater. It was a fantastic production. The Hill stage has been renovated along with the audience/concession area. Really nice.

Sunday we ate breakfast as usual at The Shed. Then headed home via the Mississippi River route. It took a lot longer than expected but was very scenic. You will have to ask about the sports car, driver and hat story.

 A picnic along the Mississippi River (on the way home)

Downtown Spring Green

We stopped at an apple orchard in Wisconsin

Mississippi River from Wisconsin side

Inside the tunnel at Tower State Park

The hand dug hole for making lead buckshot

My Saturday morning run took me by this