Memorial Day Weekend

It seems like every summer we are scheduled to the hilt and just running around like crazy. Well, we're not even to summer yet, and things seem to be picking up. Andrew has been traveling a bit for work, first to Houston and now he's in New York for a couple days. It seems like he's home for a few days and then off again. Packing and repacking. And part of that is because he and I also got away for Memorial Weekend! Yay! We went up to the Gull Lake area again. The same place we visited last year at this time.

Tom and Pat arrived Thursday evening to get settled in with the girls. Ella and Lily were sooo excited to get to spend the whole weekend with Bubba and Grand Pat. We said bye to the girls Friday morning and quickly packed and got in the car while they were at Ella's gym class. We got out of the driveway about 5 minutes before they returned home!

Here's some pictures I took of the resort as I was wandering around:




Although we loved staying at Grand View Lodge last year, we thought we would try a different place this time. So we booked a golf mini-suite at Madden's Inn. Whereas Grandview was on the north end of the lake, Madden's is on the south end on a peninsula between Wilson Bay and East Gull Lake. Our package included all meals and unlimited golf. Heaven for Andrew!! Friday afternoon he played on the Pine Beach East course. He was able to play by himself so he played two balls and replayed several holes. He ended up playing about 48 holes instead of just 18! Again, Heaven for Andrew! Saturday morning we had breakfast together and then he headed out to the Classic course while I headed over to the Spa for a facial and pedicure. I had a really relaxing time and he enjoyed more than 18 holes of golf again.

Saturday afternoon we headed over to play a little mini-golf at Pirate's Cove. We decided to play the more challenging Blackbeard course and had a good time. There was a group of 7 unchaperoned pre-teen boys in front of us. Rather than get annoyed by them, we were making bets on which one of them would fall in the water first or get hurt first. After about 11 holes they decided to throw in the towel on the golf and headed on over to the go-carts. Andrew tends to like to make things even when we play, so he usually gives me a one-stroke handicap per hole. Well, I was kicking some butt with my mini-golf putting because we ended up tying WITHOUT the handicap! :-) I almost beat him too!

After the rousing round of mini-golf we headed into Baxter to see the new Indiana Jones movie and have dinner at Poncho and Lefty's Mexican Restaurant. We really enjoyed our movie going experience. It's funny, the last Indy film came out in 1989 and I think much of the audience was probably preteen to middle-age. Well now almost (ugh!) 20 years later the audience was about 20 years older on average too. HA! That really made us feel old! And the theater in Baxter was pretty old-school, just like we were watching the movie back in 1989, no stadium seats, small theater, limited concession stand. It was a lot of fun! The movie itself was mediocre. I actually enjoyed the first half quite a bit. It was pretty much classic Indy but the last half, was a little out there. Sort of Indiana Jones meets Close Encounters. However, it is classic Spielberg/Lucas through and through. It sort of combined their fascination with adventure and the otherworldly. :-) At any rate, if you're at all a fan of Indy, you should at least see it! There was a small hint at the end that the classic fedora and whip might be passed on to Shia LaBeouf. Hmmm.....that might be interesting. But, I think the franchise is best left alone as it is. :-)

Here are some shots of the golf course from our room. That's Andrew on the green.:




Andrew spent Sunday morning playing golf at a different resort right down the road, the Bobby course at the Legacy Courses at Cragun's. He really enjoyed his outing and playing the very scenic course. While he did that, I just relaxed reading and hanging out around our resort. I even spent part of the time sitting on the beach reading by the lake, which was great! That afternoon we headed to Nisswa to go to a couple of the cute shops and pick up some gifts for the girls. We enjoyed a quick bite to eat at Rafferty's Pizza. They have one of the top 100 best pizzas in the country!! And it WAS good! After our speedy visit to Nisswa, we headed up north to Bemidji to visit with Jon and Jessica Slusser and their adorable little guy, Hayden. He was so cute and happy! It was fun to see all of them again.

Monday morning we got up early and both played the Social 9 course. We had the course to ourselves for the most part and had a lot of fun. I had some decent shots and some really awful ones. But we both had fun! After that, we packed up and headed back to Eden Prairie. We really had a fun weekend and enjoyed our time away from everyday life. And the girls had the time of their lives with Bubba and Grand Pat! Ella got to go to a birthday party for one of her classmates on Saturday. She was sooo excited about going that she woke up at 5:30AM on Saturday! She had so much fun. And it was a drop off party so I think that made her feel like a "big kid". They also enjoyed visiting the mall, Target, Original Pancake House and Applebee's with the grandparents.

Thanks so much to Tom and Pat for watching the kids for us. I think they survived all right! And had a lot of fun themselves! I don't think the kids ran them too ragged. :-)

(I'll add pictures tomorrow after I get them uploaded to Shutterfly!)