I’ll start with thanking God and Ohio for the totally perfect weather yesterday. It couldn’t have been better if we’d designed the forecast ourselves! Low 60’s, sunny, and windy. Seriously beautiful in every way. So thank you powers-that-be for that refreshing goodness! We loved it!
Ted’s present on our wedding day was an I.O.U. with a due date of March 11, 2011. So Ted spent his Friday afternoon 99th in line at the ritzy Kenwood mall, stationed outside of the Apple store for four hours ready and waiting to welcome the iPad 2 into our family. There were over 1,000 people in line by the time the 5 pm release rolled around, but from all indications it sounds like they had a great time! He made friends with the people in line around him so he was in good company. They held one another’s place in line for bathroom, food and drink breaks, shared info on the latest iPad apps, and received Godiva chocolate samples, bottled water, and Gap 30% off coupons from the other stores in the mall. Apple closed the store at 4 pm to stock the shelves with the 9,000 new iPads and accompanying accessories and re-opened at 5 pm. Every person in line was individually brought into the store by their own personal Apple shopper’s assistant who walked the store with them, collecting their iPad and accessories and ringing them up by swiping their credit card on the iPhone. A totally brilliant way to control the impending madness and chaos so it doesn’t even have a chance to start! By 5:45 Ted had his new baby in hand and was out the door, anxious for me to arrive home from work so he could open it.
He’s been attached to the new addition since Friday night, lovingly adding music, building folders, downloading apps, and enjoying all its fun features. I think anyone could easily admit it’s a nifty little genius of an invention.
Saturday morning we cooked a quick & dirty breakfast of scrambled eggs, turkey sausage, English muffins, and strawberries and blueberries before venturing to the quaint, historic downtown of Main St. Milford, OH which, for the record, is completely adorable.
We parked right on the charming Main St., which was lovely in part due to the absence of parking meters. Our first stop of the day was Bishop’s Bicycles, one of those home-grown “don’t make ’em like they used to” bicycle sales and repair places where the family dog greets you at the door and they encourage you take the bikes for a test drive in the park out back without holding your I.D. for ransom just in case you feel compelled to forget to return it. They had a nice selection of Schwinn’s, Jamis’, and a few other reputable brands, along with a slew of helmets, handlebars, bells, baskets, insulated water bottles, and other biking gear. I tried out two bikes, honestly grateful to be able to still ride a bike after 13 years without immediately nosediving into the pavement, and got a better idea for what style, frame size, and brands I might be interested in for when the time comes to purchase my own. This place is definitely one we’d love to use for future bicycle repairs and maybe to buy mine. They even had tandem bicycles. I love how vintage chic tandem bikes are!
Our next visit was to Common Cents Coins & Collectibles. Ted is a coin and note enthusiast – he loves rare, old, and unusual money. Naturally, we had to go into this store! He instantly spotted a note he’s been searching for for years, a $10 Andrew Jackson note for the cool price of $115. We didn’t get it, obviously, but it was neat to see. Meanwhile I examined over-sized $500 and $1,000 bills (which I didn’t even know used to exist!) and various silver dollars.
The next store on the street, The Coolest Toys on Earth, was the store we really came to Milford to explore. Someone at work told Ted about it, so as we were searching for its location on the iPad, we lucked out and realized there were other neat stores on Main St. as well. This tiny store was choc full of knickknacks, puzzles, games, gadgets, and old-fashioned toys. My favorites in the store were the snap firecrackers, air propellers, ant farms, kites, sweet old crank music boxes, and a wooden puzzle gamed called Over the Moon. They had lots of “samples” of all the toys out so you could play with nearly everything! We left with a foil bag of airtight freeze-dried mint chocolate chip astronaut ice cream, which actually tastes just like normal ice cream, if you can get past the foamy texture.
For lunch we stopped at Quiznos for sammie’s, just like we used to do when we lived in Lansing. I’d forgotten how delicious Quiznos sammie’s are! Does anybody else remember the old Quiznos commercials with the weird little singing monster with the scratchy voice? “They got a pepper bar!” My friends and I spent the better part of our high school years perfecting our vocal mimicking of it. What the heck was that thing anyway, and why on Earth did they think this creature would be a good mascot for a sandwich shop? Though clearly we still remember the commercials after all these years, so obviously the oddball served its purpose.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FhfcdqMTtU4]
And just try to keep me out of an establishment called the Sugar Cupcakery! Visit their swoon-worthy website here! They make the most delectable cupcakes ever! For a treat, they are simply amazing and the icing is so creamy it nearly melts in your mouth! I had the whiskey butterscotch and chocolate orange. Yes, they really are as good as they look. Your drooling is justified.
I was inspired by the Sugar Cupcakery’s original flavors like chocolate stout (with Guinness baked into the batter!), banana caramel, and lemon raspberry to imagine some ideas of my own for scrumptious cupcakes I’d like to make one day: chai caramel, orange amaretto, lemon lavender, green tea cream cheese, German chocolate Andes mint, and butterscotch pistachio. Maybe I should open my own little niche restaurant and bakery with a select menu of my specialties and favorite dishes.
After we left Milford we drove through the phenomenally wealthy and outright gorgeous suburb of Indian Hill oogling over the house’s we’ll never live in. The land looks like it’s out in the country, hilly and curvy, and the mansions are truly stunning. Then we drove past a fenced in yard full of these:
Why, yes, those are furry longhorns in the middle of the ritziest neighborhood in Ohio. We couldn’t help but pull over on the one-lane narrow road to take a closer look and laugh. I mean, these guys rock, but they look so out of place! This is literally the last place I’d ever expect to see them – among the pools, manicured lawns, 5-car garages, and 19 room villas.
We went to Saturday evening mass, I made a fantastic Chinese chicken recipe for dinner (that I plan to share with you all tomorrow!), and we cuddled up on the couch to catch-up on last week’s episode of Big Bang Theory. What a great Saturday! Hope your was just as wonderful!
