Fall in Minnesota

This weekend Joe and I made the 6 hour trip up to Minnesota to celebrate both Joe and my mom's birthdays. In case you haven't noticed, I love my home state. Even if it was rainy the entire weekend.

Rainy Minneapolis

Saturday morning, I met some of my girlfriends for brunch at Urban Eatery in Minneapolis. Urban Eatery took the location of one of our regular places a few years ago, but habits die hard and we still end up going there quite often. Luckily, the food and atmosphere are very good. Joe asked me if it was going to be all girls, and when I told him that it probably was he decided to stay at home with my brother in law. Little did I know, my friend Ashley's boyfriend came because he thought Joe was coming. He had to sit through about 2 hours of girl talk. Poor guy. 

Ashley's boyfriend was taking the picture

Urban Eatery is right across the street from my favorite Minneapolis lake, Lake Calhoun. I used to live across the street from this lake, and I miss it terribly. Every time I come up to Minnesota I always plan on driving over and taking a run around it like I used to do almost daily, but it just never happens. After brunch, I felt the need to cross the street and pay it a visit. 

Later that night, we headed over to NorthEast Minneapolis to Gasthofs Zur Gemutlichkeit (or just Gashtofs), a German restaurant in town, for dinner and Oktoberfest. My sister let my borrow her dirndl that she got when she went to the Oktoberfest in Munich, Germany a few years ago. Apparently, everyone at the Munich Oktoberfest is either wearing a dirndl or lederhosen. Here, it was about 1/4 of the people. 

Spaetzel and Wurstteller

Rouladen

Dad and the meter sausage

Before mom and dad went home with the girls (while the rest of us stayed for Oktoberfest) the babies had their first polka dance.

Along with enjoying strong German beers, we played hammerschlagen, a game where you stick a nail in a piece of wood, and, going one hit at a time, hit it with the narrow side of the hammer while holding the hammer with one hand. The first one to get the nail all the way into the wood wins. Harder than you think it is, and a game I have played at parties up north before (not to sound too lumberjacky). 

I also was lucky enough to run into my friend Adrianne. All in all, it made for a fun night. The next day, for my mother's birthday, we went apple picking at Emma Krumbee's in Belle Plaine, Minnesota. I went back to Kansas City with 1 bag of Haralson apples (baking apples) and 1 bag of Honeycrisp apples (the best apples ever, and (fun fact) ones that were developed at the University of Minnesota) Expect some recipes with apples in them coming up. 

Hope you all had a good weekend!