Chicago Road Trip: Part 2

(see part 1 here)

Day 4:  Minneapolis, Minnesota

After our night in North Dakota, we crossed the state line into Minnesota, and started driving to Minneapolis.  It was a really pretty drive - there are lakes everywhere.  It was nice to have a short day of driving; Minneapolis is only about 3 1/2 hours from Fargo, and we got there by lunchtime.


We ate lunch at another Man vs. Food spot, the 5-8 Club.

Rachel and Tristan enjoying the restaurant's famous "Juicy Lucy" cheeseburgers, with the cheese cooked inside the meat.  They thought that was pretty neat.  Do you see the wild braid on the side of Rachel's head?  She had been teaching Tristan how to braid in the car, and for the rest of the trip he was doing practice braids in mine and Rachel's hair whenever we would let him (Oliver was teasing him for wanting to learn something “girly”, but we told him it could be a useful skill to have – even Bear Grylls braids things to make rope, right?) 







After lunch we drove over to the famous Mall of America.  I remember seeing pictures of this place on my friend Becca's blog when she lived in Minneapolis, and we thought it would be a fun place to take the kids.  It's huge!  There are over 500 stores and 50 restaurants, plus an aquarium and an amusement park.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We started out in the Lego store.  We probably could have spent all day there.  It was pretty neat to be surrounded by so many Legos. 

After that we went over to the amusement park area and bought enough tokens for each kid to choose one ride to go on.  We all went along and watched as each person went on their ride of choice, which made it fun for the whole family. 

Tristan chose a climbing activity instead of a ride.  He was harnessed in, and then got to climb/walk/balance his way up to the top.

At the very top there was a plank, and the final goal of the whole activity was to walk out to the end of it.  Tristan got up to the top and stood there for awhile.  We could see him having some sort of a discussion with another kid who was up there, and then he just turned around and started coming down, without ever going out on the plank.  You probably can’t tell, but that is him way up at the top:

 


We were all yelling at him from down below, trying to get him to go out to the end of the plank.  We couldn’t figure out why he had stopped.  We finally got his attention, and convinced him to try it.  After he did it and then made his way back down, I asked him why he had hesitated.  I felt really bad when he answered – he had thought that the rope he was holding onto that slides along in the track could slide right off the end of the beam above him, taking him all the way off the edge – he didn’t realize that it would stop when he got to the end of the plank.  He was brave to do it anyway, even though he though he might go zooming off the edge if he couldn’t stop the rope from sliding.     


Oliver picked a big roller coaster, the Rock Bottom Plunge, for his ride.  He loved it.
 


Rachel also picked a roller coaster, but chose a slightly more mild one.  

It has all the twists and curves and speed that she likes, without the rock bottom plunges that she hates.  No rock bottom plunges for her, please.



Elizabeth had her eye on the swing carousel right from the start.  She had a moment of panic at the beginning because she couldn’t get herself up into the swing by herself (we hadn’t been allowed in with her) and she thought the ride was going to start without her, so there were some tears and drama involved, but once the assistant got her safely buckled in, she was all smiles. 



She waved and smiled and said hi to us and we waved and smiled and said hi back every time she came around.  It never got old. 



Henry got to ride a horse on the regular carousel (and Cynthia and I got to come along for the ride).  He loved it, but was focusing very hard on steering his horse and winning the race, so no smile here. 


Cynthia didn’t choose her own ride.  She fell asleep and took a nap the whole time in the pack – she’s easy-going like that. 

After the Mall of America, we drove back to downtown Minneapolis and dropped Daniel, Tristan, and Oliver off at the baseball game.  The rest of us got checked into our hotel, and then went swimming.  The pool at our hotel was my favorite pool of the trip.  It was up high on the sixth floor, and there was a wall of windows with a great view of downtown Minneapolis.  The kids swam and swam and then posed for millions of jumping pictures. 



Meanwhile the boys were having a great time at the game.  They said that this one was their favorite of the trip (so I guess we all loved Minneapolis) – I think it was a combination of the neat baseball field with downtown Minneapolis in the background, the perfect weather, and the excitement of the Dodgers beating the Twins 15-0.  Here they are at Target Field:

 
The field was less than a mile from our hotel, so they just walked back after the game.

Day 5:  Madison and Milwaukee, Wisconsin

The next day was our last day of driving before we arrived in Chicago (where we stayed for 3 nights).  By this time all the kids were expert road-trippers:



Tristan and Cindy were also asleep when that picture was taken, but you can’t see them. 

On our way to Chicago we stopped in Madison, Wisconsin to see what the capital city was like.  It’s an interesting city, surrounded by lakes.




We had heard about a neat botanical garden in Madison, and since we’ve never been to one with our kids, we had scheduled that into our trip.  It was really pretty, and everyone enjoyed the break from driving.



Rachel posing by a reflecting pool:

Rachel and Elizabeth pretending to be princesses in a castle:


Daniel and the kids – not quite sure what they are doing.

Running around being wild, doing somersaults, playing tag, playing red light/green light, etc.  Enjoying not being in the car.

Cindy trying to crawl without actually touching the grass.  Our yard is even worse than usual this year because of the drought, and our grass is non-existent, so she didn’t really know what to do with real live grass, except try to eat it. 

After we had explored Madison, we drove on to Milwaukee. 




We ate dinner at a Man vs. Food spot called AJ Bombers.  We shrunk our children so they could all fit in this little beach chair sitting in front. 

Haha – just kidding.  It was a giant chair. 

It was a fun restaurant.  Here is Oliver making crazy eyes at his wings:



And Rachel was a fan of their famous fried cheese curds.  I liked the fried cheese curds, but afterward I wished I had just asked if they could give me un-fried, regular cheese curds.  (Side story:  When I was growing up, whenever we drove from Utah County to St. George we used to beg my dad to stop in Beaver at this big cheese factory to get cheese curds, and I thought it was the best thing ever.  We called it squeaky cheese, because it made the best little squeaking sounds when you ate it.  I always thought that was its real name, but I realize now that maybe we are the only ones who called it that.)  Anyway, the fried cheese curds were good, but to me it just seemed like regular melted cheese.  And not squeaky at all.   

After dinner we left Wisconsin and drove the rest of the way to Chicago (it is only about 1 1/2 hours from Milwaukee). 

We had so much fun in Chicago, it is going to get its own post, so that’s all for now.