BIG Minneapolis Post

Two weekends ago Nate and I decided to get in a visit with Nate's brother, Joe, his wife Naomi, and their kids Layton and Izzy. They only live about 6 hours away and compared to the rest of our family, that is CLOSE! They had a full agenda for us when we got there so we got to play hard the entire time.

Our first night there we went to an awesome park nearby while Nate and Joe played tennis. Wish I got some pics of that. Then Naomi, the master chef, made a delicious dinner which I am salivating just thinking about it.

The next morning Joe took us out on his boat. We ate a delicious lunch and then got our wake boarding/tubing on! Unfortunately I didn't get any pics of Nate but he did AWESOME for how long it had been. Then we wanted to try and get the kids on the tube and get comfortable in the water.

Naomi sitting with Lyla getting their feet wet...

But when they got on the tube, my extremely cautious Lyla was anything but comfortable.

Then I hopped on the tube to try and make her feel more comfortable and when Joe started pulling us (SLOWLY), she was still PANICKED! So her tube ride lasted all of 30 seconds. One day she'll learn to be a little more adventurous... hopefully.

Who is that?

Oh right, it's me! After Lyla got off the tube, I went out with Layton and he LOVED it! He is a total fish. After that, Joe pushed me back out so he could thrash me around a little bit. Lyla was on the back of the boat watching and was in complete hysterics watching me out there. But, it was a lot of fun and I almost fell off multiple times. But I was determined not to let go so Lyla wouldn't think for a moment that I had died. Because that's kind of how she was acting. As Naomi put it "It was like watching her parents get eaten by dinosaurs."

Ly acted the same way when Nate was wake boarding and she kept spitting out lines like "All done!" "Get back in the boat!" and "No, DON'T get back in the water!". It was all a little sad that she was so traumatized by it but also really cute that she was so protective of her parents. Love you Ly!

Naomi and Iz snuggling after her nap.

After I tubed, Nate got back on the boat with Layton. Look at how cute they are together! These two had a great ride.

The next day we were able to see a tiny part of the Great Mall of America. It definitely lived up to its name... that place is HUGE and actually has a theme park right in the middle of it! We started off at LegoLand.

Lyla LOVES Woody from Toy Story.

Joe and Izzy. Isn't she adorable?

They had such awesome Lego structures!

For some unknown reason, Lyla LOVES those big stuffed mascots that walk around and you can take pictures with them. She thinks they are the best thing ever.

Of course, we HAD to ride the escalator for about 30 minutes before we had lunch...

And can you believe it, Rainforest Cafe had their frog mascot walking around the restaurant. This just totally made Lyla's day! She was so excited that she even grabbed his hands and started to dance with him (which consists of jumping up and down really fast). I got some on video but the quality is horrible since it was so dark. Oh well.

After lunch we decided to go to the theme park. Naomi and Iz were great sports waiting around while we went on a few rides.

We chose to go on the log ride since it was the only one Lyla and Layton could go on. Joe and Layton had a log to themselves and decided to sit in the front and they got DRENCHED! It was so funny, despite the fact that Layton was not very happy about it. Poor kid. And as you can see from the picture below, Lyla wasn't a huge fan either.

And then they had even MORE characters running around. Here is Lyla with Dora and I don't know the other guys name. She actually doesn't even watch Dora but she was still thrilled.

The Backyardigans?

By the end of the day, we were all exhausted, especially Layton...

Ruby LOVED Cache, their dog. He kept licking her face over and over again and she just LOVED it!

And Ly loved Cache as well. He's such a good dog!

Ly LOVED her uncle Joe. Every time he was gone she kept asking Naomi, "Where's Joe?" And she would just look at him with adoring eyes and she loved watching movies on his iPad. It was really cute!

She also loved her Aunt Na. They are total buds!

We seriously had such a fun time with Joe's family and we wish we could have snuck in a few more trips before we move. Thanks guys for being awesome hosts! Miss you guys already!!