Weekend Trip to Duluth

Well, it's been a while since we've taken a family vacation, and by "a while", I mean "never". So we thought it was about time that we take a little trip.

Back in December, my cousin announced that she was engaged and asked if the A's and I would be in her wedding. I had never been in a wedding before (except for my own) and was super excited that she had asked us. Big A was the ring bearer (or ring boy as he called it) and Little A was the flower girl. Back in December I asked her, "Are you SURE you want an 18 month old and an almost five year old in your wedding???" She said absolutely! And without hesitation too...

So there we were, eight months later, headed to Duluth for a long weekend. The rehersal was Friday afternoon, so I took the day off and we left early-ish so we could have some time to play and explore before the rehersal. The trip up was relatively uneventful. Which is nice.

We arrived in Duluth around 1:00 in the afternoon and spent some time at a rest stop over looking Duluth and then ventured down to the waterfront. There was a big ship down in the harbor that was converted in to a floating museum, so we took a tour of that. The kids held up pretty well, considering it was an hour long and it was a lot of standing and listening. The guide was funny (and cute) so I enjoyed it.

After the tour, Jose bought Big A a pirate ship model. He was pretty excited to have a "REAL LIVE PIRATE SHIP!" We had just enought time to relax with an ice cream treat afterward before we had to head up the hills again for the reharsal.

Big A in front of the ship with his very own pirate ship.

The rehersal got started late thanks to ridiculous traffic on the freeway headed north. Yay for end-of-summer-gotta-get-north-one-more-time traffic on a Friday afternoon combined with construction. Didn't ya know? There are two seasons in Minnesota. Winter and road construction. Old joke? Yes. Not funny? I know. True? Pretty much! Anywho, the A's did pretty well. They walked up holding hands and walked back off. Precious? Absolutely! I had nothing to worry about! They were pros! Little did I know...But more on that later. Big A's highlight of the rehersal was climbing Enger Tower with his daddy.

Big A and Daddy on top of Enger Tower

Playing at Enger Park before the rehersal

Saturday morning, we spent some time in the pool. I got my hair done up all pretty, which was fun. Then the four of us met my parents at the Duluth Zoo. If you weren't aware, Duluth had a major rain storm about two months ago which was pretty devastating to parts of the city. Roads were completely washed away, as well as sewer systems other utilities. One part of the city that was hit was the zoo. They lost several animals and some of the enclosures were left unsuitable for the animals. There were several animals who are spending some time at other zoos until the place is fixed up again. Big A was pretty concerned about their safety and any impending storms that might suddenly appear and kill us all (he's got some major storm anxiety). Little
A was infatuated with the grizzly bear. She watched him forever and when it was time to move on she kept telling him "Bye bye, bear!" Over and over and over and over and OVER again. Pretty cute stuff if you ask me.

If you're still reading, congratulations. You've accomplished great things. But here's where it get fun.

The kids were lookin' good. Big A was in his dress pants, shirt and tie; and Little A was in her pretty flower girl dress. The music started playing and I, with the rest of the wedding party, walked up the aisle. Pretty soon, Little A wandered up, in the middle of things. She saw me and said "Momma!" and ran to give me a hug. She wanted to stay with me. I pointed out Grandpa and she got so excited to see him (she's a grandpa's girl) so she squealed and said "Boppa!" and ran off to see him.

Mean while, the music kept playing, and on schedule, up came the handsom ring bearer... backwards. Here came Big A carrying his pillow, moon walking up the aisle. Then he walked behind the groomsmen...backwards. Realized he was in the wrong place and walked in front of them... backwards. He handed off the pillow and the best man took the rings, then off he went... backwards! I was half horrified and half in tears from laughter! Then my cousin, the bride came up the the alter and while they stood there waiting for the song to finish, here comes Big A again... you guessed it, folks, BACKWARDS! Everyone was laughing. He moon walked to the little stand that was holding the glass vases with the unity sand. I was so scared that he was going to trip and knock it over. Big A plopped the pillow down on the table and backward walked away. I was going to die! I kept mouthing to my cousin "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry" She just laughed. She said she loved the show the A's put on. Someone told me that they alone made it worth the gas money to drive up there. Haha

The next morning, it was time to head home. Big A wanted to see the "up and down bridge", so we drove across it and ended up finding a nice beach at the end of the long point. It was beautiful. The kids played in the (freezing cold!) water of Lake Superior. Big A learned how to skip rocks and Little A perfected her sand throwing skills. Jose convinced Big A to get buried in the sand. He pretended to be The Sandman from Spiderman 2 then. Super funny!

Probably one of my favorite pics from the trip

Big A being The Sandman

We decided to try to aviod any traffic on the freeway for the way back and chose to drive through Wisconsin instead.

Overall, I really enjoyed the trip. It was nice to spend time as a family all together, and I especially enjoyed spending some good quality time with my husband. We don't get that often.

Next trip? A road trip to California next October for his brother's wedding. They're in that one too...