I love Wisconsin.

I know. It wasn't exactly what you had expected to read. But Reader, I loved it. Maybe it was the fried cheese curds. Keep reading.

As I mentioned in an earlier post, we escaped America's Second City last weekend for our first anniversary. M surprised me, but I had a hunch we would be going north. I had no idea that I would find Wisconsin to be so beautiful.

First of all, it's not flat. Seriously. There are hills everywhere. And while there's tons of corn and cows (and cheese, I guess), it's really beautiful. Lots of streams, rivers and lakes, probably because it's so close to Minnesota which has like a million or something. And it's full of little towns like this:

Mineral Point, Wisconsin. M booked us in this beautiful, historic inn (it used to be a brewery, but now the top two floors are fantastic rooms. They still brew their own beer out back.)

We spent the weekend just lazing around, exploring Mineral Point and enjoying the perfect weather.

And then we went to Iowa. Yep, Iowa. I mean when you're 30 minutes away, you've got to make the short drive, right? Notice, however, that I didn't entitle this post I love Wisconsin AND Iowa. Because, let's face it, I didn't love Iowa. Dubuque, Iowa in particular, I guess, since I can't throw the baby out with the bathwater. Or whatever that saying is. Maybe it was the fact that it was a Sunday. And there was literally no one ANYWHERE. There was one coffee shop open (yes, Iowa, I contributed $3.22 to your economy. You're welcome.) It just wasn't really anything to write home about. Oh, except for this.

This, my Southern friends, is the MISSISSIPPI RIVER. IT'S BLUE UP HERE. Not brown, not muddy. Blue. Clear. Extremely beautiful. Upon further review, this view made Iowa worth it.

So that was our weekend away, I'll spare you the romantic details, but it really was exactly perfect, especially because of the before-mentioned fried cheese curds. "What the heck?" you might be thinking. "Curds? GROSS!"

No, no my friend. I am salivating even writing about them. These fried little nuggets of, you guessed it- cheese curds- are an appetizer, served with varying sauces. And we're not talking about mozarella sticks from your local Olive Garden. We're talking high-quality, exceptionally yummy cheese. Fried in some sort of cornmeal/flour batter that was unbelievably good. Yeah, I know fried foods are bad for you. And fried cheese is probably even worse. But man they're good. And so Wisconsin if you know what I mean.

And in this perfect atmosphere we celebrated, laughed, looked longingly into one another's eyes, etc etc etc (fade to black) and thought a lot about what has happened this past year.

Wisconsin is known for its cheese, afterall.