Mall of America

This weekend we had a mini getaway and went to the Mall of America.  The last time we went was a miserable experience as Bryleigh was about 9 months old and was right on the verge of learning to walk and did NOT want to sit in a stroller.  This weekend was much better!  We had our moments considering we have two children under 5 in a huge mall for hours at time, but nothing that couldn't be easily managed.  Bryleigh did amazing sleeping in her pack n play.  She would lay down, talk and play for about a 1/2 hour and then fall asleep and wake up around 8am.  We were dreading the sleeping situation since she usually does not fall asleep easily anywhere but in her own crib but she was an angel when it came to sleeping.  We were even able to get her to nap at the mall.

The kids (especially Bryleigh) had a blast just looking out our hotel room window to see the airplanes landing and taking off about every 30 seconds. It was definitely a way to entertain the kids for a bit! 

 In between finding summer clothes for the kids and several things for myself and Bryan, we made a few stops along the way!  We stopped at the Peep store and had tons of free candy samples. 

Christian helped me mix together some Mike and Ike flavors.  I wish we had one of these closer!  I LOVE Mike and Ike's but only the pink, red, blue, and watermelon flavors! 

 Here is our little miss priss who does not like any type of bug, critter, or anything that appears to resemble a moving insect, holding a hermit crab.  We sat here for about 5 minutes just holding crabs.  But this little stinker will scream, cry,  and try to exit the bathtub if she sees a piece of fuzz because she thinks its a bug.  Uh sigh, what am I going to do with her :)

We made a stop at Lego Land since last time we were at MOA it was under renovations and were unable to play.  

The Disney Store turned out to be renovated also and was a bit hit.  A little playhouse and a big screen TV playing cartoons, I swear these stores do not want us to leave!

All of the action tired this girl right out!  But Christian did amazing the whole weekend.  

 The hotel was packed but we braved the crowd and made it down to the swimming pool for some water action!  Christian was a little fishy and Bryleigh was a little too daring jumping into the water!  But they kept going over the hot tub.  Cold blooded, just like their mom, I guess!

The hotel has an amazing continental breakfast with eggs, sausage, and all so each morning we filled the kids up before heading out for the day!

 So if God doesn't work in miraculous ways...When I was a teenager, every year for my birthday, I wanted to go Mall of America. So my parents would let me take my best friend, Audrey, and we would spend the weekend at a hotel and shop. Every time, we go to MOA, it brings back so many memories of the fun things that me and my bestie used to do. As soon as we got there on Friday, I was reminiscing about this place that Audrey and I ate or shopped, and about an hour into being there, guess who we miraculously ran into, Audrey and her boyfriend, Kyle.  What a small world!  We are still best friends, but we each have our own crazy, busy lives so we don't get to catch up as much as I would like since she lives an hour or so away. But it happened to be her birthday weekend and she decided to spend it at MOA.  It was just so funny to meet her there.  We had planned to meet for lunch but in between tending to the kids and shopping, it didn't happen. But we will definitely be meeting up this summer to get up to speed on each other's lives :)

Overall, we had a great weekend but we are happy to be home.  I need the confined environment of our own home after a long weekend of letting the kids run wild. Christian even was able to take Dad into putting together his lego set that he bought!