It's good to be home!

We returned yesterday from a five-day trip. It is good to be home! It feels like we've been gone a long time.
We left last Wednesday. The main reason for heading up Norte is that C had a business meeting in the Twin Cities. We decided to make that into a family trip. We would visit my sister and then head over for an already planned weekend visit to C's family.
The drive up to MN was fine. Long and late by the time we got to my sister's place. C had his meeting on Thursday so the girls, my sister and I went to the Minneapolis Zoo, which was pretty neat. They had cheeky monkeys, a cool water fountain, dolphins, a monorail and lots of cool animals. S got to touch a shark and tried to touch a sting ray. Even though it was a little windy and cool, I let the girls run around the water fountain when we finished with the exhibits. Good thing it was the last thing to do before leaving because while they were playing, the sprinkler part went off, leaving just these water jets shooting up from the ground. Needless to say, the girls got soaked!!
On Friday we ventured to the Mall of America. Mostly I wanted to take the girls to the Underwater Adventure. It was cool. A little pricey but cool. They had one of those underwater tunnels so we saw all sorts of fish, turtles, sting rays, sharks and more. S was excited about the sea horse exhibit. The girls got to touch crabs and star fish.
I am sure we will be making another trip or two to MN this year yet. C for sure with his business meetings. But also because the girls were ga-ga over the Nickelodeon Universe in the MOA. We walked through there before the Underwater Adventure. Needless to say, the girls were really excited and wanted to go on the rides. They were pretty understandable about the fact that we were not going to play in there, instead going to the Underwater Adventure. (We'd already purchased those tickets so there was no way we had the time or money to do both.) But I could see taking the girls there in the near future so we can do Nick Universe specifically.
We left Friday night to head over for our family visit. The girls had a blast playing with the cousins. Lots of fun for them running around, playing in the bouncy house, checking out all the farm animals and more. It was a little relaxing for C and I too.
Now we are home and trying to get back into the swing of things.