Land of 10,000 Lakes

This years Polaris dealer meeting was held in Minnesota. I had never been to Minnesota so it was really fun to discover a new place.

Polaris combined 3 days of meetings into 1 and 1/2 realy looooooooooong days. The new product reveal was held at the Excel Energy Center in downtown St. Paul, MN. Despite all the crappy economic news, Polaris introduced a lot of new stuff including......

an all electic powered Ranger. Several other models were also updated and red is the standard color this year.


The second day of meetings were held at the Polaris R&D (research and development) facility in Wyoming, MN. We boarded the bus at 6:30 a.m. and returned back to the motel at 9:30 p.m. The R&D facility is amazing! It is a state-of-the-art multi-multi million dollar facility with an awesome test track.

With the meeting behind us, it was time for some fun (i.e. retail therapy) and the best place for that is:

Our first stop of the day was (of course)

the American Girl Doll store. What an amazing place. So many dolls. So many clothes. So many accessories. Not to mention the hair salon and Bistro. Sydney and I were in doll heaven (Ted not so much).

After about 8 hours of shopping we headed back to St. Paul for our RiverBoat dinner cruise down the mighty Mississippi.

The morning of day four found us at the Wabasha Street Caves for their "Gangster Tour" If you ever happen to be in St. Paul this is a MUST! We all had so much fun and learned so much about the history of St. Paul (it was a safe haven for gangsters such as John Dillinger, Ma Baker, and Babyface Nielson).

Our guide played the role of Edna Murray (the kissing bandit) and she was amazing!

We saw the gangster sights such as the Baker Boys house

John Dillingers apartment building

as well as other historic St. Paul sights

F Scott Fitzgerald's home

the Cathedral of Saint Paul

and the Minnesota state capitol

After a "Gangster" filled morning, we headed back to the Mall of America to the Underground Aquarium where we saw lots of fish, sharks, and seahorses. Then finished out the day with some more shopping and rides.

It was a really quick trip loaded with lots of fun!

Camp Cloud Rim

Sydney survived a week of Girl Scout camp (and we did too). She attended Camp Cloud Rim with another Girl Scout in our Service Unit. Camp Cloud Rim is just beautiful. Here are some of the fun things they did at camp:

Lake Brimal - they have soooo many fun things to do on the lake: swimming, kayaking, canoeing, wind sailing. The girls even do an early morning "Polar Bear Dip"


Granite wall - Sydney said climbing this granite wall was a ton of fun!


Mosquitos - I guess they have a pretty intense mosquito season. Sydney came home with over 50 bites (and she says she used the bug spray)

I am so proud of Sydney and that she survived (and thrived) at camp. I trully thought she would get homesick. I just can't belive how fast she is growing up.


This is part of a conversation we had on Saturday when I picked her up.
Sydney: (pointing out a couple of the girls who were really homesick) "...see that girl, she just cried to go home...can you even believe that!"

Sheri: "Didn't you even miss me at all?"

Sydney: "Well yeah~but not enough to cry about it!"

So needless to say, mosquitos and all, she is ready to sign up to attend again next year.

Out of a Blackout!

Yes~I am finally posting! Let's just say we have had major techinal difficulties at the Dearden House. If it wasn't for my Blackberry we would have been in a complete technology blackout.



But we are back among the technology blessed with a new laptop! Now to get all those files/pictures transferred. Hopefully you will be seeing more posts (with pictures) in the near future. We have had a really busy/fun/crazy summer, so we have lots to blog about.

What Book Are You?

My dear friend Shirley has this on her blog. She saw it on the blog of one of our favorite authors...so of course I had to try it.

You're Mrs. Dalloway!

by Virginia Woolf

Your life seems utterly bland and normal to the casual observer, but
inside you are churning with a million tensions and worries. The company you surround yourself with may be shallow, but their effects upon your reality are tremendously deep.

To stay above water, you must try to act like nothing's wrong, but you know that the truth is catching up with you.

You're not crazy, you're just a little unwell. But no doctor can help you now.


Take the Book Quiz
at the Blue Pyramid.

So insightful...I'm glad to know I'm just unwell and not crazy.

Let me know what book you are.

Foodie Giveaway!

If you love cookbooks and cooking as much as I do, you have to check out this new blog. They are giving away a new cookbook each week as well as tons of other great food related stuff. Stop by and check them out! Foodie Giveaway

Google Fun

Okay so I read about this on the blog of one of my favorite authors and then my friend Shirley did is and the results were pretty interesting, so here goes…

You Google your name, but add “needs” (i.e. Sheri needs)

Here are some of the results:

1. Sheri needs to find out why she’s being contacted by a collection agency.
Nick better have paid his student loan this month.

2. Sheri needs help with Twitter. I can barely blog let alone Tweet!

3. Sheri needs to stop playing with Google. Yeah~but it sure is entertaining.

4. Sheri needs more data. cannot compute, cannot compute, cannot compute

5. Sheri needs a new phone since she dropped her phone down the toilet. okay I can totally see this happening

6. Sheri needs to get more sleep. AGREED!

7. Sheri needs more help please. I asked please. If you only knew how much help I need.

8. Sheri needs to reinvent what she thinks marriage should be. This one was very interesting...

You should try it. Remeber Google is your friend.

Dance, Dance, Dance

Yes this is about all we have done for the past two weeks~dance, dance, dance.

Sydney and all the girls from Dance Break Studio have been working so hard this year and the past two weekends they have had competitions in St. George and Parowan.

In St. George Sydney's group took 3-2nd place awards and a Gold. In Parowan they took 3-Superior and 1-Excellent.

Their final show will be this Friday @ 7 p.m. at the new gym if anyone wants to come.

I have to say that I am so proud of Sydney. When she got mono earlier this year, I took her out of dance for about a month, and she really missed it. On the day when I was going to let her go back, I picked her up at school and could tell that she was really tired. I asked her if she didn't just want to go home and rest and she just cried because she wanted to dance so bad. It has been very hard couple of months for her and with the mono the competitions just wipe her out, but she has worked hard and has not quit, and I am so proud. Good job Sydney and all the girls!

PS~I will post some pictures as soon as our internet is working again. (Yes it is down again)

Wicked!

Okay so I finally have something post worthy to share with you.



Sydney and I were able to attend the opening night perfromance of Wicked at Capitol Theater in Salt Lake. It was AwEsOmE, FABULOUS!, exciting, inspiring, intoxicating, stirring, moving, exhilarating (can you think of any more adjectives~it was all of those as well).

I was just about to sneak one quick picture of the stage before the show started as the usher told the people behind us that "no pictures are allowed!" so I don't have any pictures to share. You'll just have to believe me when I say it was incredible.

I was only slightly familiar with the storyline but was so moved by all the great messages of friendship, love, and "looking at things differently". The cast was amazing they just made you fall in love with each character.

We were able to get tickets thru Girl Scouts and after the performance they had a "Chat Back" with some of the cast and crew. Here are some interesting things we found out:

* They have 14 semi trailers full of sets, props, costumes, etc. (about 40 tons of stuff)

* They make Elphaba green with a water based make up and a green spotlight

* Yes! Fiyero and Elphaba really do kiss~aren't Girl Scouts so cute :)

* There are a lot of costume changes in the show and some of then happen very quickly. There's one that happens during the sceen when Fiyero arrives at school that happens in 11 seconds!

* A few members of the cast shared "their story" and they all come from very diverse backgrounds. The stand-by for Gilda was a Girl Scout. She received a degree in neuroscience before deciding that she really wanted to be in the theater.

I am so thankful for this great experience that I was able to share with Sydney. It truly was well....WICKED!