Labor Day Weekend

My parents came out for Labor Day weekend and we had a great time!  I was in a cleaning frenzy before my parents came because my dad's allergic to cats and I wanted to try and rid the house of any cat fur and dander.  I dusted every possible surface, vacuumed, washed all the linens, had the carpets professionally cleaned, deep cleaned the bathroom, and even took the fan apart in their room to make sure it was clean.  It seemed to work because my dad wasn't too allergic and was able to stay here the 6 days.  He had to take some medicine, but overall I think it went well.  Here's what we did:

We....

Went to the State Fair

The Miracle of Birth Center is one of my favorite things at the fair.
We saw 1 day old piglets, a cow in labor, chicks hatching, baby goats, and lambs. 

I couldn't get enough of these tiny pigs, they would fall asleep still attached to their mom!

Mom and Dad

Us

Mom and Dad in front of the infamous butter carving station - all the dairy princesses get their heads carved out of butter, you can see the princess in the freezer behind them with the sculptor

Us as "Grand Champion Tom" and "Grand Champion Hen"

My parents doing the same

So many people!

My dad with his new friends that he made in the milk line

We ate WAY too much food at the fair, let's see if I can remember it all,
-mini doughnuts
-rootbeer
-mini cinnamon rolls
-pronto pups
-fresh french fries
-ice cream and malts from the dairy building
-cheese curds
-Martha's cookies
-all you can drink milk
-Asian fusion carnitas tacos (my favorite of the day!)

We decided to stick with the more traditional items and we weren't too disappointed!  The only items we didn't get that I had wanted to were sweet corn ice cream, honey infused lemonade, and minneapple pie with ice cream.  I can't believe that we didn't get any pictures of any of the food, maybe next year!

Went to Minnehaha Falls

Minnehaha Falls - it really is beautiful

View from the top

Us and my parents infront of the falls

Us

My parents

We went on a little hike/walk by the falls

Drove by the Mississippi River

My dad wanted to stop and take a look, just don't look too closely... the water wasn't real clean

Me and river - Matt stayed in the car, Mom was asleep and Dad took the picture

Stopped by Matt's work

My parents wanted to see where he works

Watched the BYU football game
It was fun to watch them win!  Let's not talk about the most recent games.... oh BYU


Drove around Minnetonka Lake (some gorgeous homes/mansions)

We stopped to look at the lake (it was super windy) 

The lake

My dad and Matt went boating early on Labor Day (too cold for mom and I, it was only 40 something degrees!)

Dad getting ready

Dad looking awesome!

Somehow we didn't manage to get any pictures of Matt that morning!

We went to our ward Memorial Day picnic

Matt and Dad played volleyball, but we don't have any actual pictures of them playing

Ward members having fun

Dad took this picture and I thought it looked really pretty

Went to Dan and Laura's for some wake boarding

Mom out back

The one picture we actually have of me wake boarding

Jake and Matt cleaning up

A gorgeous evening

Went to Stillwater

My mom is notorious for having to go the restroom and it was no different this trip.  We made it to Stillwater, but she couldn't wait until we found downtown.
We stopped at this cute park and my mom couldn't get over how incredibly clean the bathrooms were.
She even made us stop there again on the way home.
(To her credit they were immaculate)

Downtown Stillwater - We walked down the main street and had fun looking into stores.
We went to a candy store and tried lots of yummy samples.
It would have been rude to try all the samples and leave without purchasing anything (at least that's what I tell myself), so we got some maple fudge and a truffle.

There were a lot of old buildings

Mom and I infront of the bridge and the St. Croix River
(the river separates MN and WI)

My parents

The ferry we saw go under the bridge

There's an extremely long staircase that leads up to a cute neighborhood.  This was probably my favorite part of the entire trip.  Looking at the view and looking at the cute houses.
This was the view from the top.

My parents at the top

Another view from the top

A cute old house we saw (all these houses had backyards that overlooked the river)

This was a huge house in the neighborhood

We stopped at Nelson's Ice Cream and the portions were absurd!  A man in front of us had a huge cup of ice cream and I asked him what size it was, he replied, "child's."  The child's was the smallest size and it could easily feed 2 adults and it was only $3.00.  They fill the entire cup and then place the largest scoop of ice cream you've ever seen on top.  You have to stop by!

Notice the size compared to his head!

We also drove across the bridge so that my parents could say they made it to Wisconsin.

We had a lot of fun and were sad to see my parents go!  We can't wait for the next trip.