What a weekend. Congrats to the Denver Broncos, Peyton Manning and my fellow Cretin-Derham Hall graduate, Ryan Harris, for winning the Superbowl. Although I will always be a Vikings fan, it’s so fun to cheer for the hometown guys when I get the chance. 

Friday night involved some friend FaceTime, reading and Netflix. On Saturday morning, we had a puppy play date. Lola & Quincy got to catch up with their friend, Wally, and meet puppy Tucker for the first time. They pretty much just ignored him, but I got to play with him.
The dogs got groomed in the afternoon and we picked out flooring and paint for our house back in Minnesota. We finished errands and got home just in time for our favorite invitation – a text message letting us know that our neighbors are making pasta and we can come and eat it. This weekend it was Butternut Squash ravioli. I got to help for about 10 seconds, which is the maximum amount of time you want me in the kitchen helping, but it was fun. Making pasta is not an easy task, but it’s fun to watch and even more fun to eat. 
Also, did anyone else think Zoolander on Weekend Update was hilarious? Judging by my reaction to the Superbowl halftime show vs. everyone else’s – I might have different taste.
Sunday morning, we were on a mission. Have you heard of Flat Stanley? It’s a project that a few kids in our family have done that involves mailing a relative a letter asking them to show Flat Stanley around your neighborhood/city and then mail him back and the kids present his adventures to their class. We were lucky enough to get him a few years ago before our trip to Chicago and took him to all the fun places. We just got another one last week. We had to show him around New York City. 
For a while now, I’ve had to goal to bike around the island of Manhattan. I wanted to be able to explore some new neighborhoods. Yesterday morning, we decided to try that goal, but change it. We took the A train all the way to the northern most stop in Manhattan in the neighborhood of Inwood Hills and we walked all the way South to Battery Park. 
We got on the train at 9 AM and were heading back to Jersey by 4 PM. We stopped at Central Park, Grand Central Station, Empire State Building, the Flatiron, Washington Square Park and finally One World Trade. We stopped a few times to rest our feet and snack. We had pretty perfect weather. 
Thank you Flat Stanley for giving us a reason to get outside yesterday and pound the pavement. I was able to eat so many junk food snacks last night and not feel even a little guilty about it. 
That sums up my weekend – lots of productivity, friend time and walking. Now I just need to power through a few more days of work and I’ll be heading to the beach. Happy Monday!