Didn't I say "relax"?

Well, for someone who planned on having a mostly relaxing weekend it didn't totally work out that way, but it wasn't too bad. We still were able to do stuff on our own timetable for a change and we still managed to get a little relaxing time and "us" time in as well.

Friday was pretty much just a relaxing evening, we had dinner with my parents, came home and watched a movie and went to bed actually pretty early for a Friday, but it was so needed.

Saturday we slept in and that felt good too! I had a later than usual coffee date with my parents and while I was gone Nate put some beer we brewed two weeks ago into what is called a "secondary" fermentation (helps with the clarity of the beer).

After I got home from coffee, I went to Ali's Stella and Dot garden party. It was a lot of fun, it was such a beautiful day to be outside and she had lovely refreshments. I also fell in love with the Fall catalog and even though I have sworn off hosting parties this year...I booked one. Yes I am weak, but I figured, this way Nate won't kill me for spending too much money on this stuff. It'll be in September, with brunch, because who doesn't love brunch. I apologize in advance to my friends who are maybe sick of getting invites to these things! I'll admit to being a little selfish this time, but hey, it's kind of an early birthday present to myself. (Gonna do 30 up big you know).

I came home from the garden party and Nate was mowing the lawn - he did the entire yard, which may not seem like a huge deal, but he did it with the push mower because the riding mower still needs an oil change. And to those who don't know - our yard is BIG. Crazy big. It's tough to push mow the whole thing in one go, so I was impressed. Usually he does it in chunks over a couple of days.

So, to reward him for his hard work and just because we haven't really indulged ourselves in awhile, after we stopped by an art opening for Jes, we took ourselves out to dinner at Erte in NE Minneapolis. Expensive, yes. But worth it. Best steak ever. Tasty wine. Awesome service. By the time we were done eating we were pretty much in a food coma, combined with our very full day of activities, so we came home and played a short game before just crashing with a mindless movie.

And then Sunday was another Brew Day! Hurray! We are thinking ahead to Oktoberfest as I've mentioned before and even though we're having it a little later into October this year, we have to get the beer going now or it won't be ready in time. So yesterday's brew was an American Pale Ale, similar to Surly Furious. We made this one last year and it was gone super fast. It is one of my favorite beers we have brewed and I'm excited to have it again. While we were brewing, we were goofing around online and decided to make a Facebook page for our homebrew. Figured why not, it'll help keep our friends and family up to date on the latest! You can find it here: Pants Monkey Brewing Co.

Once the brew was done we were again completely wiped out, so we went the simple route for dinner, grabbed some Chinese take out and totally crashed.

We've got a slightly busier week on tap this week and next weekend is going to be a tad bit busier as well, Nate's aunt will be in town among other things. It will be good to see her though as we missed her the last time she was here.

On we go!!