iPhone Photos: A Memorial Day Cookout

Hello! This is Rhiannon from Liebemarlene Vintage, and I'm happy to be kicking off Lulu Letty's week of guest posts. One thing I love about Maria's blog is all of the photos she takes of the things she does and has around her house, and since I especially love her iPhone photo posts I thought I'd do one of my own.

We had a pretty epic weekend full of trips and beach-swimming, so it was nice to end it all off with a quiet Memorial Day picnic at Sweetwater Creek State Park, just west of Atlanta. The place is beautiful--there are old mill ruins and rivers and a lake, and even though every single park in the area was busy we managed to find a free picnic table and grill. We went with our pals Zack and Lauren and ate veggie hot dogs and corn on the cob, kabobs and potatoes and had beer and cider. We laughed at loud fishermen and made jokes, and the sun set and the mosquitos weren't too bad, and to top it all off we went out for gelato when we got back to Atlanta.

Back to Maria. I'm excited she's off to the Twin Cities, mostly because I used to live in Minneapolis years ago and loved so many things about it. Here are my favorite things about the Minneapolis/St. Paul area:

1. Thrift stores: This is where I first started thrift shopping on a regular basis, and I still do miss Midwestern thrift stores.

2. The lakes: Minneapolis has a lovely little string of lakes surrounded by park, and I used to go running around Cedar Lake, and it was so much prettier than my current midtown Atlanta running trail.

3. First Avenue: This might be my favorite music venue ever, dark and perfectly grungy. And Prince Dance Night can't be beat.

4. F. Scott Fitzgerald: Just knowing that he grew up in St. Paul gave the place a magical feeling whenever I went there. Eventually I ended up like Zelda and couldn't take the cold.

5. Minneapolis Central Library: The new building was kind of cheesy space-age, but I miss the brightness of it and all those books.

6. The Mary Tyler Moore Show. I always loved the show growing up, but it wasn't until I moved to Minneapolis (and got a Netflix subscription) that I really got hooked. I rented every single episode and loved every moment I walked by the downtown Minneapolis corner where Mary threw her beret.

7. Growin' Up. One of my favorite bloggers Jessica Rolland has lived in North Carolina and England, and now she's in Minneapolis, writing about a lot of the places on this list.

8. Minnesota summers. Minneapolis gets a bad wrap because of its cold winters, but no one really talks up its warm, but never-too-hot summers enough. Moving to Atlanta has made me miss them more than ever.

9. The Mall of America. I'm not even joking--the place is funny and oversized and so stereotypically American that it's not even funny, but it is kind of funny.

10. Minnesota nice. It's true, people are just nicer there. I've found that no amount of southern hospitality can beat Minnesota nice. Though as a native Midwesterner I'm probably biased.

All of that has nothing to do with the photos, but I'm just excited to see Maria's posts from the Twin Cities, and I'm crossing my fingers there'll be outfit posts on my old stomping grounds as well as all the places I never adventured to but should have.