Stinkin' Up the Great Outdoors, But the Kids Don't Mind

Well, it's cold as hell now, but this past weekend was eerily warm for December in Iowa, so let's talk about that.

Saturday was the big hang-out with my girls and do fun, cheap Christmassy things day.

It started out with a free club dance work-out class at Big Grove Brewery. It was damn good (read: painful) work-out. There were some times where the ladies teaching the class tried to do some kind of sexy move, which gave my daughters a nice mix of embarrassment and hilarity watching me try to follow along with said moves. Overall, it was a fun time and it was good to hang-out with my daughters and friends...And did I mention that it was FREE?

After our class, we met John and our friend's Burne and Chelsea for lunch at Basta. That wasn't quite as affordable, but it was a really nice meal, so it was worth the cost.

Afterward, John decided to go home and get some yard work done, and the rest of us headed to the student union where they were having a holiday thieves market. I always buy the girls a Christmas ornament that they pick out every year. So, this year, they got to pick out a hand made ornament, and they got some cute ones.

There was also free beer and wine tasting. I couldn't drink, but I did try some ginger beer, since that's non-alcoholic.

After we exhausted the thieves market, we headed downtown where they had some pop-up stores.

We went into Raygun, which I loved and I came very close to buying this book about the Midwest being god's gift to planet earth, but apparently, I do have some restraint.

I thought it would be fun to get a photo of the girls with Santa, but a friend of mine said she saw him at the library and he looked pretty creepy. We chose a different festive theme, an adorable little sleigh it's one that wouldn't potentially cause the girls to use the metoo hashtag.

But fair is fair, they got me in a cat mask for a photo too. I hope they like their only Christmas gift...

Speaking of Christmas gifts...I bought this Iowa mug at the thieves market. I thought of using it as a present for someone, but in this season of not giving, I decided to keep it for myself. It's pretty cool, huh?

When we finally got home from our Christmas day, I saw that John had raked all of the leaves in our yard, just in time for the last days of city leaf pick-up. What a guy.

On Sunday, it was still soooopidly nice outside. It was also very windy, so we decided to ride mountain bikes where we were more protected from the wind, instead of riding on the road.

The normal place we ride mountain bikes is closed for the month of December for shotgun hunting season, so we headed to Cedar Rapids to a place called Beverly instead.

Beverly used to just be vacant woods and you can see where people dumped their old cars or the ruins of an old foundation.

We got some good riding in and had fun playing outside.

I know I always say this, but I am so happy to be married to someone who likes to play outside as much as I do.

After we got done riding, we headed to a place called Parlor City for taco pizza and beer. It was a perfect way to end our play day and our weekend, before it got Iowa cold again this week.