Mama-Mini Adventures

As you may know, T escaped the state for the greater part of last week, and headed to the Canadian Boundary Waters for my brother's bachelor party. It was all fun and games until late last Tuesday night when he discovered, only hours before leaving, that his passport had expired three months prior. In a frantic whirlwind of oh no's!, what ifs, and overall madness, he finally got ahold of border control in International Falls around 2 a.m., and got an all clear that he would be OK to get into AND out of Canada with his expired passport so long as he had a valid ID and birth certificate handy. Whew! I don't know who was more relieved...T, who could escape on the guys trip he'd been so looking forward to, or me, who had been kept awake the greater part of the night by all of the drama. I'll be honest, I was NOT in any way shape or form looking forward to having a sulky depressed T to hang around with for the next five days while he missed out on the boys trip. Thankfully, everything worked out, and C & I had the remainder of the week to ourselves to enjoy all kinds of mama-mini adventures!

 Back at home, C & I played outside every chance we got, went to a different park almost every day, enjoyed a coffee/muffin date at Arnold's Perk, practiced our basketball skills, explored Arnold's Park Amusement Park, spent time with all of C's grandparents and great-grandparents, took several trips to the music park, snuggled up and read countless stories, slept in, dined lakeside at Bob's where C got to try his first hot dog (and loved it), shopped a bit, hunted turtles, and overall just had a perfect few days of mama-mini adventures.

Ballin' is serious business! If you happen to be at the park playing basketball while C is visiting, watch out! He is very curious about big basketballs, and just about every chance he has, he's sneaking off to swipe an unsuspecting visitor of their unattended basketball. 

Rainy days are made for coffee dates, snuggles, and reading lots and lots of books. 

On one of our many mama-mini adventures throughout the week, I took C inside the Park for the first time. He was absolutely fascinated by watching all of the rides, walking around exploring, and seeing the go-carts in action. Even though C is too little yet for most of the rides, the park itself is free to walk through, and you don't have to wait in line or show a wristband to enter. Another great feature for little kids...a playground situated right in the middle of all the action. I foresee many park visits in our future! It was so much fun watching C as he got to discover the roller coaster and ferris wheel that we read about in one of our favorite storybooks, An Okoboji Day, up close. Of course, on our way out of the park we had to stop to get frozen yogurt, making it one of the best days of summer so far.

C & I rounded out our week with an overnight visit at the lake house and spending some quality time with grandparents before T's return late last night. After a long day of traveling, he was pretty wiped out by the time he got home, but overall, the trip was a success, and everyone had a great time. C hasn't been reunited with papa T yet, and will no doubt just about jump out of his skin in excitement tonight when he finally gets to see his Dad again! Can't wait to see his reaction!