April 2017 St. Croix Valley Magazine

In the April issue take a peek inside the newly opened Pedro's Del Este.

As art instructor, Dave Sorenson knows: it’s a tough world out there for a middle school artist. But St. Croix Preparatory’s Elysabeth Kleinke, daughter of Jim and Diane of Stillwater, earned the Gold Key in the Scholastic Art Award for seventh grade.

 

To make sure guests didn’t have to wait for a table at San Pedro Cafe, owner Pete Foster implemented a no-wait app that allowed customers to add their name to a list without having to come into the restaurant ahead of time.

 

Birds migrating up the Mississippi Flyway for spring always weight the trees and fill the air of the St. Croix Valley.

 

The Valley has a reputation for pottery—not least because of Warren MacKenzie, the Stillwater-based potter who brought Japanese style to Minnesota. In anticipation of the annual St.

 

FamilyMeans—a Stillwater-based nonprofit that’s been in operation since 1963 and has locations across the metro, southeastern Minnesota and western Wisconsin—seeks to “strengthen communities by strengthening families.” The organization does

 

Rose Mille in Stillwater long has been a destination for vintage papers and trims, crafting supplies and—truly—a little bit of this and that and everything in between.

 

Spring has sprung at the Stillwater Farm Store.

 

While we are all happy winter is over and the flowers are coming out, have you considered how your trees and shrubs have fared? We get to hide from winter in our homes, but our landscape is not so lucky.

 

When he got to the military, Stillwater native Adam Dince was a self-described hot mess. “Those movies where the overweight guy gets to boot camp, and they pick on him? That was me,” he says. He got his high school diploma because the military wasn’t accepting GEDs.

 

He trained at Yale and sang opera in New York, but now you can find baritone Steven Marking, who lives in Maplewood, on the Mississippi backwaters in a mallard-green pontoon boat, armed with a camera, crouched behind a blind.

 

After its expansive remodeling 10 years ago, Stillwater Public Library has made a few structural adjustments with help from Gardner Builders throughout the winter months.

 

Aimee Van Ostrand’s impetus for opening her Stillwater acupuncture location was her relationship with the nonprofit Compass Center for Healing in Stillwater, which works with local veterans, offering donation-only services to