My Favorite Photos - August 2021

 Below are some of my favorite photos from August. First, Olivia finished one of the barn quilts that she commissioned to do. The "F" is for the clients' last name.

Sophia moved back to college. As a junior now, she has made some good friends at college and I love seeing how happy and settled she is on campus.

At the Carver County Fair, I had a chance to feed two parakeets that sat on my hand.

Olivia finished a barn quilt for another client.

My sister and I went to Owatonna, Minnesota, and saw this mural on the ceiling and upper walls of the Owatonna Arts Center. There was so much to see - lots of details - in the mural.

Connected to the arts center is a museum at the location where the state's orphanage was located. It was actually a rather sad and sobering place to visit. However, the stained glass windows in one section were beautiful.

Also at the orphanage museum were the old light fixtures. 

In one of the cottages that held the boys, there was a row of sinks. 

There was also an old movie projector.

At the Owatonna airport, there is a statue of three Air Force jets. 

Returning back home, we stopped in Faribault. There's a beautiful mural on the side of a building. I really like the bright colors, the different skin tones of the hands, and that the Braille letters are below the four letters that spell love. 

My sister was a good sport and sat in one of the Tilt-a-Whirls on the main street. They don't move. She's just leaning to one side. 

My sister and I also went to the Steele County Fair that is about two hours from where I live. It was really fun to see a county fair that I had not been to. At one time, the Minnesota State Fair was located at the Steele County Fairgrounds.

At one of our Lions club meetings, I arranged for the local sheriff and K9 unit to come to our meeting. Here, they are showing an example of how obedient and focused K9 Viking is when he is working.

Then there's time for play. The reward is a yellow ball. The officer swung K9 Viking in the air which he likes. This also shows how powerful of a grip the dog has on an object.

I went to the State Fair on August 30th this year with Olivia who was competing in 4-H. While she was being judged, I went to the Ag-Hort building. The floral kaleidoscope was there again this year. This is one of the images I took through the viewfinder. 

This is what the floral kaleidoscope looks like. You spin it around and then look through one of three viewfinders.

Olivia won a blue ribbon on her Diamond Dotz picture. It's an image from Harry Potter. 

Olivia and I went to the Fine Arts building at the State Fair. There are so many interesting pieces to look at. This is a collage piece.

This is a needle-felted moose. It was about 2 1/2' x 3 1/2'...quite big and an ambitious project. 

It was 3-dimensional and the head and antlers stood out from the foam background quite a bit. There were even eyelashes on the moose!

August was a month filled with day trips, art, history, and transitions back to school and Fall. 

End of Summer Rice Salad with Ground Cherries

One of the items in my CSA box last week was ground cherries. I have never tried ground cherries and thought it would be good to see what they were like. They come in paper husks that need to be removed, leaving a little gold fruit. They have a unique flavor that I'm not sure how to describe. 

Looking online, I came across a recipe for End of Summer Rice Salad with Ground Cherries. It's a flavorful salad and very easy to make. I plan on making it again this week to use more of the ground cherries; and the tomatoes and basil we have here growing in the garden and containers. 

Ingredients

1 1/2 cups cooked rice

2 cups greens of choice (spring mix, arugula, kale) (I used spring mix)

1 cup heirloom tomatoes or cherry tomatoes diced

1/2 cup ground cherries

1/2 small red onions diced small

1/4 cup olive oil

3 tbsp fresh lemon juice

1/4 cup of loose fresh basil minced

1 to 2 tsp ground sumac (I didn't use this)

1/2 tsp sea salt

1/2 tsp black ground pepper

Directions 

Cook the rice as per the package instructions. Once cooked, let cool slightly. Whisk together the dressing ingredients in a small bowl and set aside (olive oil, lemon juice, basil, sumac, salt, and pepper). 

Prepare the vegetables and place on serving plates, along with the rice. Drizzle dressing on top and serve immediately. 

August 3-2-1

3 things that made me happy in August

I enjoyed seeing the flowers blooming in our yard and at places we visited. One place that we went to was Noerenberg Memorial Gardens. There were flowers and grasses that I had not seen before, so it was fun to see these different plants.

I liked seeing a variety of bees on the flowers.

The second thing I enjoyed during August was going to several county fairs. We missed the one that the girls have competed in for 4-H. However, Olivia and I competed in the Washington County Fair and earned some ribbons and cash for our entries. I was happy to see some of my photos earn blue ribbons.

I entered ten colored pictures. This one is my favorite one - a forest scene in autumn.

I also colored an abstract one in colored pencils.

My triple-ginger cookies earned first place too. Having fresh-, crystallized-, and dried ginger adds a lot of flavor to these cookies.

The girls and I enjoyed seeing the chickens and roosters at the fair.

We had lunch in the 4-H building together.

Another fair we went to was the Carver County Fair. This sheep was asleep as we passed by.

We were able to feed parakeets.

There was also an area with exotic wildlife that you could feed or look at. 

Olivia sat in a Tesla. She is intrigued by this car.

I liked this succulent horse sculpture. 

The third thing I enjoyed during August was spending a day with my sister. She was traveling on my birthday, so she wanted to know if I wanted to do something in August. We ended up going to the Steele County Fair - about 2 hours away from where we live - and explored that area.

We started the day with Tom Thumb mini donuts.

While in Owatonna, we went to the Owatonna Art Center and the Minnesota State Public School for Dependent and Neglected Children. The building below was once the third-largest institution of its kind in the nation. There were probably 16+ buildings in addition to this one where the children and teens lived, ate, played, worked, and learned.

The art center had a beautiful ceiling and upper-wall mural. It was based on books and was so rich in colors and details.

Heading home, we made a lot of stops including in Faribault. This beautiful mural was in the downtown area. I like the various skin colors of the hands, the ASL signs for the word Love, and the Braille letters that are under the black letters. 

The Tilt-a-Whirl was invented in Faribault. There are a couple of stationary units on the main street. I had my sister move from side-to-side as if she were on the ride. She was a good sport about it and humored me with doing that.

2 things I'm looking forward to in September

One thing I'm looking forward to in September is seeing the flyover at Taco Daze. I have been working with someone who is coordinating a flyover of a Huey helicopter that was flown in Vietnam as well as four military aircraft. 

The aircraft will have the smoke coming out of them and will do a couple passes. 

On the final one, it will be the missing man formation. 

I'm excited to see how this as well as the vendor area (which I've been coordinating) comes together after 4 1/2 months of preparation and planning. 

  

The second thing I'm looking forward to in September is cooler weather and rain. The summer was brutally hot and humid. Parts of our lawn still have not recovered from the scorching temperatures. The gardens had to be watered a lot and still suffered. Having rain and the cooler weather hopefully will help the flowers, shrubs, grasses, and trees as we move into autumn and winter. 

1 thing from August that I'd rather forget

The one thing from August that I'd rather forget is a colonoscopy. My dad had one-third of his colon removed due to colon cancer, so I'm on an every-five-year check because of that. Thankfully, the prep process and time have been condensed which makes it easier. The good news is that I had no polyps this time (the first time - when I was in my 40s - I did). 

The feedback I got was that it was clear that I was eating healthy and taking care of myself. So, that made me feel good. 

The changes that I've made over the past couple of years, especially this year with doing the 75Hard Challenge in for 75 days starting on January 1st and maintaining many of those habits since mid-March, have paid off!