Life as a Yowler

Last night we were in the middle of a swim, when all the sudden the lights turned off. Just to give you all TMI, Brandon was in the pool bathroom and yells from the bathroom, “don’t worry. The hotel generator will kick on any minute” Well we found out Brandon was very wrong. No, not all hotels are required to have generators. This one did not have one. We were without power from 6pm-4am. I kind of expected the power to go out. That was about the biggest wind storm I’ve ever experienced. Not to mention there was a lot of snow. I was thankful to be inside where it was warm, even with no electricity. Those poor poor power line workers. They are really incredible. It would have been one of the most miserable nights ever to work in.

We let the kids swim until 7:00. Then we headed up to the room and brushed teeth and had the kids settle down for bed. We heard the power was expected to come back on at 9:30, so Brandon used his phone to download adventures in odyssey. We all, other than Brandon, drifted off to sleep listening to odyssey. It was good for all of us to get to bed early. I found out the next morning how restless Brandon’s night was. The power didn’t come on at 9:30. Brandon’s phone ended up dying. He was worried about not waking up in time for his meeting this morning. His alarm obviously wouldn’t go off, since his phone was dead. He was about to go brave the depths of Anarctica and go out to the car to charge his phone, when the power came back on at 4:00. Poor Brandon. He had a very restless night. The kids and I slept like rocks, totally oblivious. For those of you wondering, no Brandon is NOT ever considerately quiet. I was that tired. I didn’t even see all the lights come on at 4 . I didn’t hear the maitanace workers knock on the door at midnight checking on everyone. I didn’t hear Brandon go down to the front desk twice throughout the night. By the way we were up on the fourth floor, so that was up and down four flights of steps twice for Brandon. It’s no wonder he was wide awake.

Brandon made it to his meeting in time this morning with a fully charged phone. I didn’t get abducted in the night. Everything worked out well.

Just your average travel incident occurred on the drive to Minneapolis after Brandon’s training. From the backseat a sock was thrown to the front seat, landing perfectly in my water cup. Yay!

Mill City Museum was recommended to us to try out. Frankly we are a little tired of the Mall of America. Plus it’s a Friday. Not that the mall isn’t great. We have just done it SO much lately, due to Brandon coming to Minneapolis so often. I was looking to try out something more educational. Because of weather, we couldn’t do anything outdoor. This museum was awesome. It was very unique and very educational.

Learning about and touching different grains. The kids got to try a sample of bread after.

The girls wanted to play with play doh for awhile while the boys walked around. Brielle is my child who has played with play doh the very most. She loves it.

We went on an elevator ride/show showing all about the old grain mill, giving the history behind it. The  grain mill industry is basically what helped to build Minneapolis. After the ride, we looked down from the 9th floor.

It was a beautiful view of the city.

Designing cereal boxes. This was Brielle’s favorite part of the whole day.

They had the coolest water tables.

The log sorting table was the favorite. This entertained them until closing time.

Learning about water pressure and power. Joah was able to hold the water and fill the tube about half way. Brandon filled the tube all the way.

Caed was pretty excited about the train table.

The rest of the evening will be spent finding somewhere to eat that isn’t too busy, and possibly swimming later. Being a Friday night in Minneapolis, that might not be the easiest. Here’s to hoping for the best.

Backup for a minute. I forgot a neat little story. When we first got out of the vehicle and were walking up to the museum, a little incident happened. We were all walking along nicely when all the sudden, Caed whips his pants down to his ankles. He turns and pees in the snow, oblivious to those driving and walking by. Luckily most were laughing. I was so flustered and shocked I accidentally pushed him over face first into a snow bank trying to pull his pants up. This caused him to cry and draw even more attention from everyone in all of Minneapolis. Literally every person saw the nice yellow spot right in front of the crying boy in the snow. I explained to him peeing outside is reserved for home only. If he sees one other person around, he is NOT allowed to pee freely.