My Fabulous Weekend!! Part 2

So, last time we stopped off at lunch - which was completely delicious! =)

After lunch we walked on over to the Galena History Museum. What a great museum Galena has in it's town. There are some fabulous things on display - and they have so many things in their collection that they can rotate in and out! Seriously, if you are in Galena - take time and stop into the museum. There is even a lead mine you can look down in - which Galena is known for!

On display is a replica of a dress worn by Julia Grant - which I thought was gorgeous. A local seamstress made it based on a painting of Julia! Which is even more impressive in my book!

There was a display of children's toys that I just fell in love with - forget the kids, I would LOVE to be able to have some of these! LOL! I snapped a pic of the sewing machine - it was too cute!

I also took a picture of the old switch board - as a nod to grandma's who used to be operators:

Now before I continue, let me just take a few minutes here to get serious - this museum has so many wonderful things, but like so many small museums is struggling to get by. Now, I'll be the first to admit, I love going to the big museums, but I really love going to small museums like this one. They almost always have a local bent, most of their collection is donations - things that would be very difficult to part with because selling donated items makes you lose trust with possible future donors. So in all seriousness - much like the Galena History Museum - I bet you have a history museum near you - it might be much smaller - one floor in part of a different civic building (that is how our local history museum operates). Go, visit the museum, see what treasures they offer. And donate a few dollars (or you know, a lot of dollars) if you can. Because it's important and each local museum is absolutely different from other local museums in that it is celebrating your town's history. And yes, we do visit ours - my kids go in there. I have met the curator a few times (although probably not often enough for her to recognize me, but I do know her!).

Okay - back to the museum. After looking around, and getting to talk to Former Pres. Grant and his wife Julia

(yes, actors LOL!) my companions and I were escorted upstairs to the collection. I wish all visitors to the museum could do this, we donned white gloves:


And we were able to look around at the whole collection. I've never seen this part of any museum before - all I can say is WOW! It's amazing. We got to see so many fabulous things - pictures, clothes, purses, shoes, weapons, trunks, etc, etc, etc

(this was marked as from 1830's! I'm not one to normally want to hold guns, but I mean, really, I'm not one who usually gets to look at so many amazing things from history either!)

I can not thank Nancy (she's the executive director) and the Galena History Museum enough for this. This was completely a once-in-a-lifetime chance for me!

So after that amazing trip - I mean really, how can you top that? Oh, why you can take us all to a FABULOUS house in town - the Seal house. This house has been decorated just so amazingly beautiful - it certainly belongs in a magazine somewhere. And the owners - Brad and Roth - are just wonderful. Well, you'd have to to open your house up like that I think! (And here is where my camera ran out of battery, so we're going to use all of Kris's pictures for the rest of the day)

After looking at their gorgeous home, we headed off to the Galena Cellars for some wine tasting!

I might have gotten slightly embarrassed at some points and blushed a little (or a lot). ;-)

But it really was a fabulous time!

Now, I am normally not a wine drinker, and I tried each wine to be a good sport, but didn't like them. I've never found a wine I liked. But our server - who was just the sweetest - told me she thought i'd like the last two we tried. And color me surprised - I did! So I bought a bottle of each and brought it home. Now, my husband laughed in surprise when I told him because he thought I'd never meet a wine I like. Well, thanks to Galena Cellars - I know exactly which type of wine I like - so fun!!



The Blackberry wine has already been opened and I'm enjoying it a glass or two at a time =)

After giving us all that wine to drink - it was time to go check into our room and get ready for dinner. Well, no, we didn't have a room - we were treated much more kindly than that - we had two houses we stayed in. Wow - and by house, I mean really gorgeous, wonderfully clean, no clutter, lots of space, and beautifully furnished house. All courtesy of Eagle Ridge. The house was so nice - I could easily live there full time and be happy =)

And then it was dinner time. At Fried Green Tomatoes. Who, also served the best fried green tomatoes I have ever eaten in my life!

At this point I wish I could share smell, taste, and sound with you - because all the food smelled and tasted divine. Oh, I felt like I was being completely spoiled. And sounds - had you been there you would have heard much talking, laughing, and just all of us having a wonderful time. Well, except when the food was first served. Then you would have heard silence as we all dived in! So so so delicious. I wish they would deliver to me when I'm at home ;-) I would order out a lot! LOL! =)

After that - it was quite late. And so it was time to go to bed! I'll write about Sunday's adventures later! =) Because Sunday was amazing too!!

*Just a reminder that this trip was sponsored by the The Galena/Jo Daviess County CVB.
** Part 1 of the trip is over here.
*** Part 3 of the trip is over here.