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Sever’s Stories, Riddles, & Rhymes is Silly Fun for Families (Review)

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Sever's Riddles

This past month I shared that Sever’s in Shakopee is offering a safe, unique drive-thru event this fall! It’s called Sever’s Stories, Riddles, & Rhymes, and it’s a safe storytime adventure with magic, humor and visuals.

This unique adventure includes a 3/4 mile magical trail where families will be able to enjoy humorous rhymes, riddles and large scale illustrations that give readers of all ages a whole new take on storytime. There will be a huge treasure hunt, a larger than life chicken samurai, a zany squirrel named Hayley with her adorable pumpkin pet, and a lot more!

It takes place Thursdays to Sundays now through November 1st, and the cost is $7 per person or $25 per car maximum.

It sounded like a good option for families during this time, so we decided to go check it out and share our experience with you. We went recently and thought it was cute, silly and sweet!

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Words on Bathroom Walls – Movie Review & Digital Book Giveaway (Ends 8/20)

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Words on Bathroom Walls

Families – there’s a new movie in select theatres (yes, theatres!) this Friday, August 21st, and it’s one to check out especially if you have a teen.

It’s called Words on Bathroom Walls, and it’s based on a popular young adult novel by Julia Walton. It’s a love story about a high school senior who is diagnosed with a mental illness. He tries to keep it a secret while falling in love -=with a brilliant classmate who inspires him to open his heart and not be defined by his condition.

My (Spoiler-Free) Movie Review:

I watched the movie this week so I can review it. (I watched it by myself as I thought it might be too mature for my kids.)

I thought it was a beautiful movie. It’s 1 hour and 50 minutes, and it’s PG-13 for language and dark themes. The movie is more about Adam’s schizophrenia than about his love life. He struggles with changes in his family and recently diagnosed mental illness, as his family tries to support him and tries new medications to help him. Well, the medications cause side effects, and he doesn’t feel he can talk to his family honestly. It’s real and raw, and Maya is one ray of light in his daily life.

Like with most movies, I thought that many things were exaggerated. I wasn’t sure that people were just being cold and heartless to Adam, or if his schizophrenia made him perceive the world that way, and that’s simply what the movie was showing us. But I thought the way the world was handling his mental illness was very outdated and demeaning. In this way I didn’t feel it was realistic, but the movie had a good message and is definitely worth seeing. (I agree with the movie’s rating though and I don’t recommend it for kids under 13.)

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Girls’ Day Out! Driving Bulldozers at Extreme Sandbox in Hastings, Minnesota

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Extreme Sandbox Hastings

Two moms driving bulldozers together. Driving over dirt piles, pushing vans, flipping tires.

Sounds like a perfect Saturday afternoon, right?

Well, it is – my friend and I did this, and it was awesome!

Until this year I had no idea a place existed where a girls’ day out – or any other day out – could involve driving heavy construction equipment together, and having fun doing so!

Then I learned about Extreme Sandbox in Hastings which offers anyone age 14 and up to drive heavy construction equipment just for fun. (Thus the appropriate name “Extreme Sandbox” – it really is a giant sandbox for adults and big kids!)

Heavy Metal Drive Thru

And since March, when they had to temporarily suspend their regular business, they offered “Heavy Metal Drive-Thru” shows that you could watch safely from your car, for FREE!

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Dinosaur Adventure Drive Thru Review (& 25 Things to Do in Your Car While in Line 2 Hours)

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Dinosaur Adventure Drive Thru

Dinosaurs have arrived at the Minnesota State Fairgrounds! And you can see them in a safe drive-thru adventure called “Dinosaur Adventure Drive Thru.” It’s happening the weekends of July 31 – August 2 and August 7-9.

Tickets are $40 for a regular car, truck or minivan that seats up to 7 people. We bought a ticket for opening day for the 6-8pm timeslot. 

This is what our confirmation email said:

Dinosaur Drive Thru email

So we arrived at 6:20pm and the line was starting to go out past the main entrance off Snelling Avenue to the street. I figured it wouldn’t be long once we got in. 

Minnesota State Fairgrounds Dinosaur Drive Thru

However, the line of cars actually wound around the fairgrounds and the attraction was on the other side, so we literally sat in our car until 8:20pm – for 2 hours! – before we got to the entrance of the Dinosaur Adventure Drive Thru!

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The Secret: Dare to Dream Movie Review & Book Giveaway

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The Secret: Dare to Dream

There are many things I’ve missed during COVID-19, and one of them is going to movies!

But thankfully you can still see new movies – just digitally!

On Friday, July 31st, a new, uplifting movie called The Secret: Dare to Dream will be available on Premium Video on Demand, and moms – get your girlfriends together for this one! It is totally worth seeing!

I had an exclusive opportunity to see the movie in advance at home. I watched it with my mom and we both absolutely loved it! My mom said it was a beautiful movie, and I agreed.

Without spoiling anything, I want to share my review of this movie, plus a taffy recipe (you have to see the movie to understand why)! AND I have a digital download of the BOOK to give away! 

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Our Visit to Wild Mountain Winery in Taylors Falls (& Wine & Cheese Plate Deal!)

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Our Visit to Wild Mountain Winery in Taylors Falls (& Wine & Cheese Plate Deal!)

My friend and I got together this past weekend to just have fun around the Twin Cities, and one of the places we had been wanting to go is a winery.

I had checked out Groupon for deals and found a great one for Wild Mountain Winery which is in Taylors Falls. It’s not far from Wild Mountain Adventure Park, too. Both are open right now during COVID but with social distancing requirements, of course.

The deal was for two glasses of wine, a cheese & meat plate, and a bottle of wine to take home, for only $24! Regularly it’s $38. There’s also a deal for double that (four glasses of wine, etc.) for $48. That’s more ideal for two couples to share, so my friend and I just got the first deal.

Check out the Groupon deals here!

Our Experience

We went on Saturday afternoon and arrived just in time for live music, which we didn’t even expect! Many people were seated at the patio tables enjoying the beautiful day.

Wild Mountain Winery

We traded in our Groupon voucher for our wine and cheese plate. We got to actually choose our wine from a list, and sample up to 3 if we weren’t sure what we wanted. They had about 16 to choose from, listed from dry to sweet. I chose a Mountain Sweet Red wine, which is fairly sweet. It was delicious!

Wild Mountain Winery

My friend and I enjoyed our wine and cheese plate at a table as we listened to the live music. They have a list of their live music on their website.

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Imperfect Foods Subscription Box Review (& Discount Code)

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Imperfect Foods Review

Imperfect Foods Subcription Box Review & Discount Code!

For a long time I had been hearing about Imperfect Foods, which saves foods that aren’t “perfect” enough for grocery stores, but are perfectly good otherwise. You subscribe and get to customize each weekly box with produce, meats, dairy and snacks. I had seen people post pictures of their boxes online, and I became curious about trying it myself.

Then last November at the Minneapolis Holiday Boutique, there was an Imperfect Foods booth. I learned about the boxes and arranged to try one to review here on my blog. However, this spring due to COVID-19, they were super busy and backed up, so I was on a waiting list for a while. But then I got the email that my delivery was coming the following Monday! Yay!

So here is my review of my experience from ordering to delivery!

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Our Front Row Experience at Extreme Sandbox’s “Heavy Metal Drive-Thru” in Hastings

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Heavy Metal Drive-Thru

In April I posted about a unique and FREE event for families in the Twin Cities area. It’s at a place called Extreme Sandbox in Hastings, MN, where you can operate real construction equipment. It’s family-owned and they even were on the popular show, Shark Tank! (Check it out – it turned out well!)

Unfortunately, Extreme Sandbox had to close this spring to regular visits due to COVID-19, but they came up with an alternative – Heavy Metal Drive-Thru, a FREE drive-thru show where you can park your car in their lot and watch their heavy construction equipment at work!

Heavy Metal Drive Thru

Then the show became so popular they added more shows, now through the end of June!

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Our Drive-Through Visit to the Minnesota Landscape Arboretum

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Minnesota Landscape Arboretum Drive Through Visit

After being closed for a couple of months, the Minnesota Landscape Arboretum had opened its doors to drive-through visits only starting May 1st. We visited during May and below is my recap!

However, I just learned that they are now in Phase 2 – which means they are open for walking on designated paths as well. Check out their website for details and updates.

We had visited the Minnesota Landscape Arboretum a few years ago when our kids were younger (see my review!), and it was a full day of walking, exploring and playing. But now with so many places closed due to COVID, we were getting excited for any place we could visit, even in our car. The Minnesota Landscape Arboretum was open to drive-through visits only, so we booked in advance, paid the $15-per-vehicle fee (free to members), and visited on a Saturday morning in May! (Note: Since our visit they have opened some walking paths and the price is now $15 per person, though members and kids 15 and under are free.)

There were a LOT of cars, but traffic moved steadily. There were some spots where it got backed up and we were stopping and starting, but for the most part it was just a nice, slow drive along their 3-mile drive.

We entered and our printed ticket was scanned (you need to have it ready in advance), and we proceeded through. The visitors center was closed, though I learned that the parking lot there is now open.

Note: All of these pictures were taken from our car, since everyone is required to stay in their car except for using public restrooms in two areas of the drive if needed.

Also – this is not a sponsored review. We paid for our visit and this is just our experience!

Minnesota Landscape Arboretum Visitors Center

The first part of the drive was through some wooded area. I loved this little cabin in the woods!

Minnesota Landscape Arboretum Cabin

There were various types of landscaping along the way – sculptured hedges, for example.

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Device Pitstop is Open! Our Experience Selling and Buying Laptops (Maple Grove location)

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In the past few years, our laptops have gotten slower and slower (zzzz), as technology tends to do!

My kids each have one for schoolwork at home (and for some fun kid-friendly websites), and it was just time to replace them both. One had pretty much stopped working, and the other was just too painfully slow. We realized that the RAM for both was only 4 GB (at least 8 GB is ideal), and they were getting pretty old (one was 10 years old), so we figured we got all the life out of them that we could.

We had purchased them used at Device Pitstop of Maple Grove, which buys used devices as well, so we decided to head in to see how much we could get them for and what newer ones we would find!

With practically everything closed right now due to the pandemic, it was so nice to drive up to Device Pitstop which was totally open for business like normal. Computers and other devices are certainly essential right now!

We brought our old laptops up to the counter to sell them, and the team member scanned them to see their condition. As he did this, we browsed the store.

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