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Published: March 27th 2007
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Greetings from Minot! Well I've been here going on a full 4 days and I honestly can't say that it feels a whole lot different from being anywhere else. But I'm getting ahead of myself.
To start with, I had no idea the stress that awaited me after I signed off the last time in the PHL airport. My flight was delayed due to another flight coming in which killed my layover time on my next flight. Now you might say, "Cool! Who likes a layover anyway?" Well, I do if it means the difference between having some time to kill reading your book or sprinting like an Olympian through an unfamiliar airport terminal in order to not miss your connecting flight at your NEXT stop.
So my flight from PHL was delayed. My flight from Cleveland was on time leaving, but got in late so I ended up running through the Minneapolis airport as well. But alls well that ends well (or that just ends!) and I made it to Minot in one piece. As an added bonus, we got a splendid display of the Northern Lights from the airport throughout the whole flight from Minneapolis. Score.
Living/Dining Room - Before
This is one wall of the room before painting that originally was the dining room, but Jo & Josh decided to turn it into the living room. Aurora Borealis aside, the most impressive thing to me was that my luggage actually made it as well. I thought for sure that if I had to run like a madman through two airports to make my flights, there surely was a chance that my bag wouldn't be as lucky so I was really overjoyed to see it coming through the carwash-like flaps on the baggage carousel. Yay!
Jo met me at the "Minot International Airport" - and I use the word "international" loosely. Apparently if an airport receives any flights that originate outside of the airport's country, it can be deemed an "international airport". Makes sense, but it was not exactly what I expected. In fact, I think I've visited bush plane airports in Alaska that were larger!
In any case, she managed to find me in the crowd (not exactly a difficult feat), we grabbed my luggage from the single baggage claim belt, and off we went.
Jo & Josh's new home is adorable...and big! I couldn't get over the amount of space as I was given the grand tour. One of my tasks this week is to help her get some of the
Living/Dining Room - After
Same wall after painting. The blue didn't come out quite the same in the picture, but it's a very deep, rich blue and looks gorgeous against the woodwork. painting done since the previous owners had nothing but white on the plaster walls with the exception of the bathroom.
There are some oddities, which older homes are often known to have, but these were a first for me.
To begin with, the house was listed as having 1-1/4 bath. Can't honestly say that I understood that when I saw it on the spec sheet, but apparently it means that there is one full bath upstairs, and then in the basement you will find the only shower the house. And not just a shower in the basement, but an unenclosed shower on a PLATFORM in the basement. I'm not making this up. Every time I've stepped up "on stage" to take a shower, I feel like I'm expected to entertain the troops before stripping down...or perhaps the idea is to entertain the troops BY stripping down! Either way, it's a little strange and I have to wonder why someone would set up a shower that way - a question I don't believe really has an answer.
The next thing that caught my attention about the house was that there's this fabulously huge attic, but the only access
Living/Dining Room - After
Another part of the dining-turned-living room after painting. I think the blue comes out a little more true-to-life here. I just loved the windows on the wall to the left. Craftsman homes have just so much character. to it is through the upstairs bathroom. There's a staircase that comes through the wall and ends just to the left of the toilet. This really makes for a great place to put your bathroom reading, but not terribly practical if you were in the attic and wanted to come down while the "facilities" were in use. Josh said that he's considered putting an "OCCUPIED" light in the attic so if someone is using the bathroom, you'll know before you happen in on them.
That's all for my commentary on the house for now except to say that it really is adorable and they are both doing a lot of great work to make it their own. I can see that it's really going to come together.
So let's see... I arrived Friday night. Saturday we were up and out and took a drive to Bismarck roughly 100 miles away (and capital of North Dakota in case you don't remember that from 3rd grade). On the way they took me to visit the Lewis & Clark Interpretive Center and a reconstruction of Fort Mandan where the Lewis & Clark expedition spent the most time out of all their
Front Room - Before
Here is a before picture of the front room we painted green. winter posts. We watched a 10 minute orientation video which covered details about the Lewis & Clark expedition as a whole (Louisiana Purchase, etc.) and then received a personal tour of the reconstructed Fort from one of the employees who also happens to be a full-blooded Sioux (if I'm remembering correctly).
Since I've never given North Dakota much thought in the past, I must also admit that I didn't really realize the extensive part it played in the Lewis & Clark expedition. It is very much a part of their history here - they even have a commemorative Lewis & Clark license plate.
The rest of the day was spent in Bismarck. We went to Home Depot, Lowes, ate at Taco John's ("offering the best in Tex-West"), and then headed back to Minot.
Sunday was low-key. We had been up later than late, so we skipped church, ran some errands, and visited the Minot Scandinavian Village.
The Scandinavian Village is actually part of the Shirley Bicentennial Park and sports a granite globe, flags of all the Scandinavian countries to represent the heritage of Minot, a giant 50-foot-tall Swedish Dala Horse (which Jo & I speculated might
Front Room - After
After painting shot of the same part of the room. I just LOVE that color. house either chocolate or perhaps Greeks), a 200-year-old+ log home from Sweden (which apparently was disassembled, shipped to Minot, and reassembled making it the oldest home in North Dakota), and a replica of an 800-year-old Stave church. Beautiful. There was also a life-sized statue of Hans Christian Andersen who I managed to coax into telling me a story. Unfortunately, I have no photos of my own to share (having forgotten to take Jo's camera with us when we ventured out). So in place of my own, I'm just going to see if I can't find some pictures from other bloggers (which ensures they will all be properly credited!)
Yesterday and today Jo had to work, so I figured I might as well also. It might sound like a bummer to work on vacation, but I actually didn't mind. It helped make the days go by faster, and kept me from getting bored.
Tomorrow is my birthday (wahoo!) and I will be...well...older than I was last year. The day should be fun and include painting followed by dinner & a movie (my request). We'll be eating at 10 N Main (that's a restaurant, not someones home address). From what I understand it is hands-down the best restaurant in Minot - which may not be saying much since I think that title probably went to Applebee's before 10 N Main opened a couple of years ago... Anyway, I'm looking forward to it.
That's all for now. Sorry for the lack of pictures, but I promise I will be posting some later. For now I should go see what Jo is up to.
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