Northern Travels - Part 1

We just returned from a 10 day long trip to Minnesota where we had a wonderful time visiting lots of Jesse's family.  It was my first time meeting many of them and also my first time further north than Tennessee! There are so many pictures I want to share, I'm going to split this up into two parts.

We started at Marilyn's sister's home outside of the Twin Cities.  After a 20 hour drive we were thrilled to have a place to clean up and beds to stretch out on - but not before a campfire dinner, complete with s'mores!

(With combinations of suggestions we concluded that s'mores with bananas and peanut butter are the best way to go!)

The next day we went to the Mall of America.  We only had a few hours to spend here, which was not nearly enough.  It was larger than I imagined and would take all day or more to go through!

I left the mall with a bag Lindt chocolate and a Minnesota t-shirt. :)

Continuing north in Minnesota, our next stop was at Marilyn's brother's lake house which included lots of fishing and a great 4th of July meal!

(There's nothing like the sunrise and sunset across the water.)

(Lots of early mornings on the lake. But it got so hot it was worth getting up early to enjoy our time fishing.)

(Captain Duane)

(Marilyn's first catch this day was a little bitty fish!)

(I was quickly reeling in our dinner for that night.  However, I wouldn't touch the fish, so it's not posed properly for the picture.)

(They caught these at the same time. Marilyn's won in size!)

(Captain Marvin taking us out for a ride in "the chariot.")

(Jesse catching some air!)

(Gene having as good, if not better, time than Joaquin!)

(Marilyn looking graceful during her ride.)

(YUM!)

(One kid and a bunch of adults, so we did a lot of game-playing with Joaquin.)

(Headed out to watch the fireworks. This is what it looks like at 9:45pm in Minnesota!)

(Fireworks, at nearly 10:30 when it was finally dark enough to light them!)

Stay tuned for Part 2 of our trip!