weekend lens {Olympics & pickles}

Friday night was the Olympic Opening Ceremonies and we decided to stay home, order some pizzas and spend the evening watching this on TV.

I made a fruit pizza for dessert to go with our 'Olympic and pizza' themed night. :)

Saturday morning we headed out to the Minneapolis Farmer's Market to find the things I needed to make dill pickles and dilly beans.

Organizing my canning supplies.

The big bag of pickling cucumbers.

dill

I haven't canned pickles for a few years- it is quite a bit of work, but it is always worth it!

While I was busy doing my canning, Pete and Drew worked on the Z.

And Drew took it upon himself to trim a tree that was taking over the basketball hoop. :)

I made the easiest rib recipe ever and they turned out amazing!

All I did was put some 'country style ribs' (no sauce or anything else) in the crock pot and cooked them on low for 8 hours. Then we thew them on the grill to char them up a little and brushed them with BBQ sauce.

So good and so easy!

We also had some great corn on the cob from the farmer's market.

It was nice to have a weekend at home that was quieter and to have time to do some of those extra things (like canning) that we have been wanted to do this summer.

Marquette

Tuesday morning we left the hotel in South Bend and started heading to the next college we were going to tour; Marquette University in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.

Driving back through Chicago, we decided to make a quick stop

at Gene and Jude's. :) We wanted to pick up some hot dogs to bring back in the cooler for Tyler who stayed at home this weekend.

We toured Marquette

and Jake was able to get a look at another school. (I really think the more schools you can look at the easier it is to get the feel of what school will be right for you.)

The cute little Joan of Arc Chapel.

Now time to get back home. :)

Notre Dame

So, after the fun-filled weekend in Chicago at our family reunion; we continued on with a couple of college tours for Jake. The first stop was Monday at Notre Dame in South Bend, Indiana.

Jake had been to Notre Dame a few times with a friend- but this was the first visit for Pete, Drew and me. {Photos from November 2009 and April 2010.}

The campus was everything I pictured it to be!

We arrived on campus a little early, so Jake showed us around a bit before our scheduled tour.

The Basilica of the Sacred Heart.

The Fighting Irish.

The Main Building which is where admissions is.

Looking up inside the Golden Dome.

Waiting for our tour to start.

The famous Golden Dome with the 19 foot tall statue of Mary.

The Clarke Memorial Fountain.

The 'Word of Life' mural on the outside wall of the Hesburgh Library. As our tour guide told us; Notre Dame is known for two things: Jesus and football and so many statues, etc. have nicknames. This mural is better know as 'Touchdown Jesus.' 

This statue is nicknamed 'First Down Moses.'

A classroom.

The Tunnel leading to the football stadium.

'Christ the Teacher' statue.

Jesus statue with the Golden Dome in the background.

The 'Immaculate Hand Off' statue.

The 'Grotto of Our Lady of Lourdes.'

Two boys resting from the heat.

This campus is so beautiful!

The Memorial Door at the east entrance of the Basilica of the Sacred Heart.

The South Dining Hall

where we finally stopped to get some dinner.

Inside the dining hall was really neat. It is said that the producer of the Harry Potter movies based the dining hall in Hogwarts from this hall at Notre Dame.

It was so hot and humid with the temp getting to 101, but that didn't slow us down from seeing everything we wanted to see! We spent about 7 hours on campus and even still, none of us were in a hurry to leave. :)