Minneapolis

It is a warm, breezy night on the plains, so warm that heavy rain and thunderstorms are in the forecast for tomorrow. It is very unusual for this time of year. We just got home, having driven home from the Twin Cities tonight. That's right, we were visiting the home of Garrison Keillor, Prince, and Al Franken. We were there for the weekend, visiting Sarah's parents, who were in town for a big kid's event at a church there. Sarah spent her high school years in the Twin Cities area, so she was able to show me around a little bit. It was a nice getaway, kind of a last-minute mini-vacation.

We drove up after work on Friday night, arriving there fairly late and saying hi to Sarah's parents. Saturday morning, we all went to the Mall of America, which is enormous, a huge mall with a theme park in the middle, complete with real roller-coasters. Sarah worked in the mall for a while, so she knows her way around it. Asher really liked the Lego store.

After lunch, Sarah, Asher and I went out sight-seeing in downtown Minneapolis. We visited the really cool sculpture garden:

The Mighty, Frozen Mississippi:

The Mill City Museum, which is built in the partially collapsed ruins of a huge flour mill (we need to go back and spend some time at this place): The downtown skyline from an old stone bridge over the river:

The very cool Guthrie theater:

We also drove to St. Paul, where we saw the sites, including the Fitzgerald Theater, home of "A Prairie Home Companion". In Apple Valley, Sarah showed me her old house and high school.

This morning, we went to church to hear Sarah's dad preach, and to say hi to some old friend's of Sarah's. After lunch with Sarah's parents and a too-soon goodbye, we headed back south to Iowa, stopping for our obligatory Cabela's visit (part of all of our roadtrips it seems) in Owatonna, Minnesota. Now we are back. We are tired, but it was a weekend well spent.