Weekend Trip

The Arrowhead Chorale sang the Brahms Requiem last Sunday in St. Paul in conjunction with the conservatory high school there.  Since I don’t drive in the cities, I convinced Dr. Peds that it was a great weekend to take a family trip so that he could drive me to St. Paul.  I usually try to avoid going to The Cities as much as I can because, well, there are just too many people and too many lanes of traffic there for my liking.  So, even though it’s only a two and a half hour drive, or so, I usually manage to only go there about once a year.  We actually have a list of things we would like to do there as a family, but I’m fine with it taking several years to check of those things on my list.  Anyway, since we had to go, we decided to go for the weekend and stay in a hotel in downtown St. Paul that was right next to the church that my concert was held at.  This was much more convenient that I ever dreamed, because it meant that we parked our car upon arrival and didn’t need to drive it until we left St. Paul on Sunday night, since we could walk everywhere we needed to go except for one grand adventure we took using public transportation.

Before we left Duluth we ate at our favorite pizza restaurant, and then piled into the car for an evening drive down the interstate.  I took some advice from a friend and decided to just let all four kidlets burn themselves out with unlimited opportunity to use electronic devices for the whole car trip.  It was the quietest car ride ever, although there was a bit of squabbling about who had which electronic device, but for the most part they worked it out.  

We arrived in St. Paul just after sunset, and after a little craziness figuring out the streets by our hotel, we settled into our room.  

Even though they went to sleep late because of the excitement of the hotel room, the kidlets were up with the sun, waiting to go swimming.  Dr. Peds and I staved them off as long as we could and then gave in.  There was, of course, much swimming over the course of the weekend because my kidlets love the water.

Everyone always wants to be right next to their favorite grown up in the water. 

The shark is coming!  Run for your lives!

After a nice long, morning swim, we showered and tried to figure out the bus route we needed to use to go to Como Park.  Going to Como Park was one of the things on our long list of things to do in The Cities, and since the weather was perfect, this was the day!  I was the only person who had ever been there before, and the last time I went I was eleven.  First, though, we had to figure out which bus to take and which street we needed to be on to find a bus stop where the bus was going the right direction.  You would think this would not be difficult for two parents with college and graduate educations.  By the end our kidlets were a bit exasperated with us.  To our credit, we were dealing with some weird one way streets and the maps for the route were not clear at all.  Eventually we got on the wrong bus and the bus driver scowled at us because we didn’t know how the little fare machine worked.  Thankfully, however, we were able to get off the wrong bus just a few blocks away from Como Park, and we just walked a little to get there.  It was an adventure!  None of the kidlets had ever been on a city bus before.  Mr. TOF loved it with all his heart.  YaYa did not enjoy it at all.  

We took in all the sights at Como Park:  The gardens, the plants, the zoo.  My personal favorite zoo animals were the orangutans and the gorillas, along with the giraffes.   I’m not always a bit fan of long zoo excursions, but this zoo is just the right size:  big enough to have interesting animals, and small enough to finish walking through in not so much time that you are tired of being at the zoo.  YaYa loved the peaceful conservatory gardens.  We spent the most time gazing down at the pond filled with enormous Koi, a favorite of all the kidlets.  We couldn’t resist letting Mr. TOF ride on these cute fire trucks so that he could spray water on the burning building as the ladder moved up and down.  He was really, really excited.

Watching the middle kidlets on the bumper cars was quite possibly the most entertaining six dollars we’ve spent in a long time.  At first they couldn’t quite figure out what they were doing, (Despair from Mr. SP . . . glee from The Banana)  but by the end they were sort of getting the hang of it.  Driving took so much concentration that Mr. SP’s tongue was out for much of the time, although you can’t really see it in these pictures very well.  

The grass was green in St. Paul, and the trees were beginning to get their leaves!  It was a nice break from the chilly gloom that has invaded Northern Minnesota for weeks on end.  In fact, it almost felt too warm!  The kidlets spent a long time playing on the play ground by the picnic area.  It was a brilliantly designed playground, I thought, with all of the hills for kids to run up and down to get to the slide.  The kidlets definitely prefer old school playgrounds, but even they were impressed with this modern playground, although Mr. SP was not a fan of the monkey bars.  It was a great choice for such a busy park, because so many kids could play on this playground at once.

We rode the bus back to our hotel and after much deliberation, decided to have supper right in the hotel before doing a little more swimming.  Unfortunately I acquired a nasty headache from not being used to so much sun, and everyone was tired, so we all zonked out early.  

There was a delicious bagel shop just a couple of blocks away, and both mornings Dr. Peds brought breakfast from there.  Yum.  We liked it so much that we actually ate lunch there too on Sunday.  Right after I settled the kidlets at the table, an older gentleman approached us and handed me a $20 bill.  He said, “Happy Mothers Day!  You have a  hard job.  Take this and give it to your husband to buy your lunch.”  I was so surprised!  I said, “Oh you don’t have to do that!” But he insisted that he did want to, and let me tell you, it really made an enormous impact on my kids, who had never heard of anyone just randomly doing something kind like that.  They had so many questions, and I told them we’d have to think about something kind we could randomly do for people too.

My Sunday afternoon and evening was spent singing.  Dr. Peds gave the kidlets the choice of going to the Science Museum, the History Museum, or the Children’s Museum.  I was surprised that they ALL wanted to go to the children’s museum, even though three of them had visited it before.  The spent the afternoon having a great time there, and it was especially convenient since it was across the street from the church I was singing in.

After my concert they came to pick me up, and my wonderful husband was super kind to carry the big green box with all sorts of folders and chorale stuff that was my job to transport.  It was only a couple of blocks to the car, but the box is awkward.  Mr. TOF was delighted to announce to me that we were getting ice cream.

Dr. Peds researched this great little ice cream place , Grand Ole Creamery, that was tucked into the area of St. Paul with all the big fancy houses (which I loved driving by).  It was an adorable little place with a locally owned feel, and the ice cream was absolutely amazing.  The texture and flavor were perfect, and they make their own waffle cones and bowls fresh.  It was a super delicious treat.

Here’s that unsuccessful four kidlet picture.  This is actually the best of ten tries.  

This little guy was convinced that he was going to find Spiderman crawling up one of the tall skyscrapers.  We didn’t actually see a big Spiderman, although we did see several kids dressed up like Spiderman and Superman, and he got his face painted like Spiderman at the museum.  Maybe Spiderman was over in Minneapolis this weekend?