July 4th Weekend

Hellooooo - is anyone still there??

So very sorry my blog has been slacking lately. Between working full-time, taking extra weekend call, being a mommy, wife, domestic diva, etc there hasn't been much time to devote to this blog or to much of anything else I love to do lately. Besides, we haven't really done anything too exciting or blog-worthy to share with you all so that is another reason why I haven't posted an update lately.

We did do something pretty fun this past weekend though! We spent the 4th of July holiday with my family in Minnesota. We had all pitched in money to rent a house in downtown Minneapolis (thanks to vrbo.com) & ended up having a great time! 

We left super early Friday morning which bought us 3+ hours of sleep time from Mase. After a couple of pit-stops & some breakfast we ended up getting up to MN around 1230pm. Everyone else had gotten there Thursday but due to Shane's work schedule we had to leave Friday morning. We all ate lunch when we got there & then we spent the rest of the afternoon at Lake Harriet. 

Lake Harriet was a great place for families & children. There was a huge park for the kids to play at, walking trails, bicycle rentals & trails, nearby gardens, a variety of water activities like canoe & paddleboat rentals, a bird sanctuary & a huge amphitheater for outdoor concerts. It was a great place to spend the afternoon & the entire family had fun participating in different excursions throughout the day.

 

Later that evening we celebrated the 4th holiday by grilling hamburgers & hot dogs along with all the sides & had us a feast. Conveniently, the house we rented had a park right across the street where the whole family was able to watch the spectacular fireworks show downtown Minneapolis put on for the public. It was 30 minutes of amazing, huge, loud fireworks & Mason somehow managed to sleep soundly through the entire thing. 

Saturday we spent the day at Como Park & all the kids had so much fun. This place was awesome for the little kids & the big kids as well! Half of the park was a zoo & the other half was an amusement park with rides, games, fair food, etc. The best part about this place was that admission was based on "donation" only so you gave whatever you thought was reasonable to enter the park. The price of the pass to ride the rides was very reasonable also. We also had brought a small cooler in with us & packed lunches for everyone so the day spent there was super inexpensive for all.

 

We spent the first half of our day there riding the rides. Mason had tons of fun on the toddler rides & his cousin Joslyn was such a huge help keeping him safely inside the rides. 

  

Shane & I even got in on the fun & went on the zip line ride:

Once the amount on our ride pass ran out, we all sat down, ate lunch & then made our way over to the zoo. As soon as we crossed over into the zoo entrance Mason fell asleep & missed the majority of the animals.

 
Grandpa Farm (my dad) spent most of the day hanging out with Dana so that my sister & her husband could take their other 3 kids on all the rides. I just love these pictures of them two:

After our day at Como Park everyone was pretty exhausted. We got back to the house, made our family favorite Tater Tot Casserole & grilled up some chislic - a South Dakota favorite as well! 

The rest of the evening was spent hanging around the house relaxing while the kids played across the street at the park & went for a late swim in the pool. 

While the littles were away, I got to spend some one on one time with this little cutie - my niece Dana:

Ahhh - don't you just LOVE all those chunky little rolls? 

Sunday morning it was time to pack up & get back on the road to head home. Everyone had such a great time & hopefully we can make this an annual event!?

We tried to get a nice picture of all the cousins sitting together before everyone left but there were two meltdowns - my nephew Tanner & my kid:

This was the best we could get! LOL - so much for that idea :( Should have tried to take this photo on day 1?!


I hope everyone had a fun & safe 4th of July holiday weekend!