....life on our terms....

This past weekend, Father's Day weekend no less, my Mom, Dad and little sister made the 10+ hr drive to Fargo to spend some time with Ben and I.

In the hustle and bustle of work, moving and this home renovation I was a little hesistant about the timing - but what I didn't realize is how much I would enjoy the break from our daily stresses to just enjoy the time together and do some things around Fargo that we hadn't made time for yet.

After taking them out to the house (photos to come later) we took Kait to our version of Chucky Cheese. Sorry, no photos. The resturaunt is called SPACE ALIENS. Its great for kids because it has an arcade and the building is in the shape of a UFO with Alien garb all over the place. We did our best to make sure she walked out with a couple of goodies - but I think it would have been cheaper to just purchase things from the souvenior shop rather than on the games to get tickets for the "give-away" items.

On Saturday we did alittle shopping around. The boys went to some garage sales and the girls went to the thrift stores. We all ended up with some neat finds - I love garage saling and treasure hunting.

During the afternoon we heade over to the Red River. I really wanted them to see the mighty Red - since its was once a major port of transportation, shipping and the major livelihood of many early settlers up here in the North. Also, I wanted them to get a feel for the amount of water we have to deal with during the spring. The river was slightly elevated - due to recent rainfall - but during the summer its still about ~30 ft deep in some parts. Its substantially more water than we are used to dealing with in Kansas.

This pontoon takes tours up and down the river and we hoped onto it about 3:00 p.m. Including the five of us, there were two other passengers and two captains so we got the intimate tour. It was actually nice because the captain let Kait drive the pontoon for the majority of the trip. Granted, it was only about 1 hour long - but for her it was a pretty big deal.

He also snapped a quick photo for us with the life saver before we left. It was really neat, plus I got to share my limited knowledge of area agriculture with the other passengers - they were corn farmers from Iowa on vacation. Midwest seed dealers, too!
We dinked around some more on Saturday, I think we went to a furniture store or two? I can't quite remember.

Sunday, after another quick visit out to the house (this time with the camera in tow) we hauled a load of goodies out and did some more brainstorming about work for our contractor who was to start on Monday. Once back in town, we headed to Younker Farm's Children Museum for awhile.

It was Father's Day weekend - so after frauntly representing Kaitlynn as Ben and I's daughter - we got the boys in for free. Kaitlynn really enjoyed the interactive exhibits, including the painting station. I did get my fair share of painting done also.....who says Kait gets to have all the fun?

We even had to visit the photo cutouts for some pictures, but I will admit it had started to get warm during our visit - so we didn't spend too much time out in the direct sunlight.
We wanted to show them campus, the Fargodome and other things associated with NDSU. But we didn't anticipate the Fargodome being locked........however, Ben snuck in through an open locker room door and got us in! Evidently there was a high school football camp going on and they didn't really seem to care that we were lurching around snooping while they were running drills!

So we got them down on the field for a couple of quick pictures. It is pretty neat because its rare for a college team to have an indoor stadium to play in - but up in the tundra its a necessity. Dad and Ben also snuck into the football team's locker room - but the girls weren't that brave. Especially not with Kait being there - we didn't want to expose her to any potential nudity!

We ended the weekend with another helping of home cooking and Kait getting stir crazy. None of the three were used to just hanging out all weekend without work to do or free range to play when and where you want anytime so that got to be challenging. I think they enjoyed themselves up here, I know I enjoyed having them here. Kait was so bored with no toys or people to play with come Sunday night - so I think it was good they headed home Monday morning.

I just want to end this post by saying "Thank you for coming! It was the best way to spend our anniversary weekend, Father's Day and my birthday with Mom and Dad and Kait! We hope the rest of the family gets to come soon - the house should be done by that time! We love you all very much!"