in America for the 4th of July

We got to have a great American 4th of July this year! You can see we are decked out in the patriotic shirts we bought just for the occasion.
We went to the parade in Cloquet in the morning and to Duluth for the fireworks at night. We went early to Bayfront Park to enjoy the music of the Duluth/Superior Symphony Orchestra. It was a good day. God bless America!

weekend in the cities

We just spent a long weekend in the cities. (in MN we have Minneapolis and St.Paul, known as the twin cities, but we just say "the cities" usually)
We did lots of fun stuff! We visited Valleyfair, the sculpture garden, Ikea, the Mall of America, a big church on Sunday, saw friends, ate Chinese buffet, and got to swim in a nice pool at the hotel. And it actually felt like summer! It was pretty hot and humid, but I was glad to not be cold!
Us with the spoon-cherry bridge at the sculpture garden.

At the Lego place in the Mall of America.

valleyfair

The alpine coaster (see previous post) was just a warm up for our trip to valleyfair- a big amusement park near Minneapolis.
Jean-Patrick liked the rollercoasters and was brave enough to try rides like the tower where you ride high up and then fall. (that one is too scary for me!) We got to go on lots of things, some not so extreme -like bumper cars, ferris wheel, carousel, ect. The park also has some waterslides and rides, so we did those too.

Jean-Patrick is in the blue shirt, he went on this ride with my mom, and I took pictures.

alpine coaster

We decided to try out the "Timber Twister" alpine coaster that is at Spirit Mountain in Duluth. This is new since the last time I was in the states. You get on a little cart that looks like an alpine slide car, but it is a "coaster" because it is (thankfully) attached to the track. It went so fast and I felt like we were going to fling into the woods, especially around the sharp curves. I admit it: I was screaming like a girl. And JP was lauging and yoo-hoo-hooey-ing. Seriously, that was the noise he was making.
The photos are from when we were riding back up the hill to the end - it would be kind of hard to take pictures while zooming down the track.