Website is LIVE!

My Website is up! Go to KaydDesign.com to check it out for yourself!

I'm so excited and so relieved to finally check this off my to-do list. Isn't the coding great? Yep that would be my amazing boyfriend's work. (Who knew we would just be able to figure all this out?) You should have seen us this summer -we both just sat on the couch working on different elements of the website with either a glass of wine, a beer or a bowl of ice cream. I definitely miss those nights now that he's gone for the summer.




Check it out in Firefox or Safari please. There's still a few tweaks that I need to figure out when viewed in IE
Comments and Suggestions are greatly appreciated as well so shoot me a note.

Summer's Over

Last Friday Abhrajeet left Minnesota and flew to California to write Mask and Wig's Spring Show with his friends before returning to UPenn for the school year.

This summer was the best summer we've ever had in the past 6 years of being together. Of course, we can't wait until after graduation when we don't have to squash our hang out time into the summer months. (Get it... Summer Squashing... because we have to squash everything into summer? I think we're pretty clever)


In the beginning of summer we made a list of goals. Here they are again:

• Read 15 books - Abhrajeet read while on the bus for 3 hours a day but didn't get anywhere near 15 books
• Make Money - we both had internships this summer
• Go to a Music Festival - We went to Sound Set
• Try 10 new beers - We exceeded this amount and found many new favorites
• Screen print shirts -
  
• Eat Sushi 5 times - Succeeded and it was delicious!
  
• Design Shoes -
• Cabin 3 times - Love our vacations!
• Try 10 New restaurants - We ate out a lot but didn't try 10 new restaurants
• Make website - huge thanks to Abhrajeet for coding my website: KaydDesign.com
• Learn Flash -
  
• Study for GRE - Abhrajeet crushed the test. Studying wasn't very fun but we're glad it's done
• Go to Minnehaha Falls - We visited the falls and ate at Sea Salt Eatery
• Make Movies like the old days -
  
• Take a Trip to Menomonie and visit the creamery - The Creamery was Delicious
• Work out - we worked out twice. Does that count?

I'll still update this blog with my personal work and events even though it's called "Summer Squashing"

Thanks for listening and following us
Abhrajeet & Kayd

Brew at the Zoo

Two weeks ago we went to a fundraiser for the Minnesota Zoo Conservatory called "Brew at the Zoo". It was one of our favorite date nights this summer and can't stop talking about how amazing it was.

Even before we turned in our tickets, zoo employees greeted us with Owls, Hawks and Eagles. Then we were handed a sample glass and and told to "have a great night."

18 different Beer companies were there - some were major but many of them were loco micro breweries... and we definitely love supporting the local micro brews.


Here's all the different beer either we both tried or one of us tried:

• Sheephead Ale - Brau Brothers in Lucan, MN
• *Wild Blue -Anheuser-Busch
• Choclate something... - Flat Earth in St. Paul
• Duke IPA - Granite City in Eagan
• Blueberry something... - Granite City in Eagan
• St. Peter Pale Ale - Great Waters in St. Paul
• Tighty Whitey - Great Waters in St. Paul
• Skinny Dip - J.J. Taylor in Minneapolis
• *Minnesota Tan - Lift Bridge in Stillwater
• Crosscut Pale Ale - Lift Bridge is Stillwater
• *Bastogne Blonde - Rock Bottom in Minneapolis
• *Hop Bomb Double IPA - Rock Bottom in Minneapolis
• Extra Pale Ale - Summit in St. Paul
• India Pale Ale - Summit in St. Paul
• Horizon Red Ale - Summit in St. Paul
• *Cynic - Surly in Brooklyn Center
• *Bender - Surly in Brooklyn Center
• *Furious - Surly in Brooklyn Center
• Anchor Stream - Wirtz in St. Paul
• Anchor Fog Horn - Wirtz in St. Paul
• Full Sail Amber - Wirtz in St. Paul
• Sessions Black Lager - Wirtz in St. Paul

As you can tell from the list above it was a great night. The zoo even arranged for shuttles to drive people back to hotels.

We can't wait to go next year!

Sushi Sushi Sushi

One of our goals this summer was to try out as much sushi our wallets could afford.

We tried 5 different restaurants and too many different types of nigiri and rolls to keep track of. Obvious favorites no matter where we went were the Salmon and White Tuna nigiri.



The restaurants we tried this summer were Fuji Ya, Oragami, Tiger Sushi, Akita and Kyoto.

Fuji Ya was by far our favorite place. The atmosphere was great and we can't wait to get a big enough party to sit in a blocked off party room in the back. We tried lots of different Nigiri that night and our waitress was great with helping navigate through the menu.

Origami was okay. To us the sushi seemed smaller and we were practically sitting with the table next to us we were so close.

Tiger Sushi hosted AIGA Cocktails with Creatives that me and a friend went to. We didn't get to try much but it seemed like a great place. (AND this is the first place where I had a Surley beer. Loved it)

Akita in Woodbury has the best deal. A $25 dinner buffet lets you try anything and everything you could imagine. The first time to went we misunderstood and ordered 4 nagiri or 5 different fish. Even though it was delicious it definitely filled us up way too fast. The second time we went we were pro-orderers and expanded our selection. Definitely try the Spider Rolls if you go.

Kyoto just opened up in Eagan and is owned by the same person as Akita. It's the same deal, $15 lunch buffet, $25 dinner buffet. I think it will take a few months before Kyoto will be polished but we are so glad it's only minutes away from where we live.






Looks delicious right?

We can't wait to get some sushi when I visit Philly in the fall

Szott Foundation VolleyBowl Tournament

A few weeks back Emmy organized a Volleyball and Bowling Tournament to benefit the Andrew and Abby Szott Foundation. She helped raise almost $2000! A huge thanks to Emmy for putting this event on. Since I cannot bowl very well without bumpers and Volleyball tends to make my arms really red I opted out and instead took photos the whole day.







Great job Emmy! Can't wait for next year.

Creamery Restaurant + Inn

If you're ever in the Menomonie area you should check out The Creamery Inn + Restaurant. It's located just a few miles down Hwy 25 in Downsville. They renovated last fall and ever since I saw it at the opening I've been waiting to take Abhrajeet. The restaurant uses locally grown ingredients, supports local artists and is a really neat place to hang out. They also started to host weddings and their Inn fills up very quickly during the summer months.

Caryn gave me a gift certificate to the Creamery after I photographed her little boy Devon and it was the best payment ever! Abhrajeet and I went to brunch and the menu was outstanding; there were so many mouth watering choices! To start the meal off, Abhrajeet, who loves locally brewed beer, ordered a local Belgian beer while I ordered a peach mojito. Later on he also ordered a local IPA, which was delicious.

Soon after our waiter Adrian served us bread. Instead of rolls of bread or biscuits like any other restaurant we received a little basket of blueberry scones, warm bread and muffins. They were delicious to say the least!
As an appetizer we ordered Trout Cakes. Combined with the sauce and the greens each bite seemed more delicious than the previous. One of the meals we split was the Buffalo Sliders. (Don't they look HUGE!) We weren't sure how to attack them so we squished the buns together as much as possible and took a giant bite. The sauce and cheese were to die for and we ended up taking 1/2 of a burger home.
The other entree we ordered was the Blue Prawns. This house made pasta dish was super creamy and the Blue Prawns were huge.
Even though we were stuffed we just couldn't pass up on dessert once we heard they had pistachio ice cream. We're huge fans of pistachios and this dessert was the perfect end to our meal and the best pistachio ice cream we've ever had!

A huge thanks to the entire staff for the hospitality and phenomenal food! We will definitely be back as soon as we can.

Visit the Creamery's Website
My cousin, Amber Engfer, took the photos on the Creamery's website. Check out her blog