Minnesota
At the last minute, I decided I wanted to take the kids to Minnesota to see the Ice Castles. After talking it over with Adam, we decided to make a weekend of it since we were leaving the following week for St. Lucia and wouldn't see the kids for almost a week.
We packed up the car and hit the road about 7:30 Saturday morning. We swung by our hotel to drop off our luggage before heading to Pizzeria Lola for lunch. We passed the wait time by taking photos in the little photobooth at the back of the restaurant. :)
After lunch, we headed to the Mall of America. We stopped in the LEGO store first and grabbed a few Legos for the kids before heading to the Crayola Experience. We were very impressed with this exhibit {even for the price tag - $20/person. *Teachers & Military get in free & guests with them are 50% off, but we didn't meet that criteria} We thought this was going to be about a hour of our day, but we ended up spending 4 hours there {and could have stayed longer}. I would definitely recommend this to anyone with elementary aged children!
We never stepped foot into IKEA {what a SHAME!} or the Winter Carnival at Rice Park because we ran out of time!
After lunch, we headed to the Mall of America. We stopped in the LEGO store first and grabbed a few Legos for the kids before heading to the Crayola Experience. We were very impressed with this exhibit {even for the price tag - $20/person. *Teachers & Military get in free & guests with them are 50% off, but we didn't meet that criteria} We thought this was going to be about a hour of our day, but we ended up spending 4 hours there {and could have stayed longer}. I would definitely recommend this to anyone with elementary aged children!
That night we met our friends that live in the area and they took us to a restaurant they frequent often. We met Grant and Kate on our 1st anniversary trip to Mexico in 2010 {they were on their honeymoon} and we've kept in touch ever since. So 7 years and 5 kids later, we finally met up again. They ended up coming back to our hotel and the kids and dads swam for a while, while us mamas chatted.
The next morning, we all lounged around until almost 11! Then we met Grant and Katie for lunch at the 5-8 Club for their famous Juicy Lucy's. Delicious! Afterwards, we all packed up and headed to Stillwater to see the Ice Castles. It was a super awesome experience. Now that we've seen it during the day, I really want to check it out at night as well. SUPER fun! The kids loved the slides. The only downside was the amount of people, but still worth it. *I would recommend boots and snowpants as it's pretty cold and the ground is covered in ice pellets, so they get inside tennis shoes.
The next morning, we all lounged around until almost 11! Then we met Grant and Katie for lunch at the 5-8 Club for their famous Juicy Lucy's. Delicious! Afterwards, we all packed up and headed to Stillwater to see the Ice Castles. It was a super awesome experience. Now that we've seen it during the day, I really want to check it out at night as well. SUPER fun! The kids loved the slides. The only downside was the amount of people, but still worth it. *I would recommend boots and snowpants as it's pretty cold and the ground is covered in ice pellets, so they get inside tennis shoes.
