Nelson Family Blog: Wrapping up April.

These past two weeks have flown by! The good news is that I think spring is finally here. We have finally seen some sunshine and warmer weather. The bad news is, I can't get my kids to bed at a decent time because we have had such nice evenings lately.

The week before last was a really busy one. We spent a couple nights playing in the park since the weather was so nice. Last Thursday, we decided to take the kids to the circus for the first time. They loved it. They got their cheap light-up toys, some cotton candy and nachos, and then we all enjoyed watching the circus. The kids were in awe of most of the circus, with all the lights and entertainment. They loved watching the elephants, tigers, puppies, tightrope walkers, and the human cannon ball. They pretty much loved all of it. We looked into doing elephant rides, but it was $20 a ticket, so we decided against it.It ended up getting pretty late, we didn't leave until about 10:00 pm, and we had school and work the next day. The kids did ok will it all, but they were pretty crabby by Friday evening.

Last weekend my parents came to town to visit. On Saturday, John and I hosted a bus load full of people on a tri-state greenhouse hop. Basically, we were hosts on a bust that went to three different greenhouses to allow people to shop and pick out plants. We got to hand out door prizes and tell jokes. Emma also came with us, and was really good entertainment for all the older ladies. She even sang a song for the entire bus. She was pretty cute all day. She also made about $4 worth of tips for the day. She loved every second of it. Overall it was a good day. We didn't leave any little old ladies behind, and everyone seemed to have a good time.

My parent's watched Elliott for the day on Saturday, so we could do the bus ride. After the busy day, we went out to eat at a BBQ place by Humboldt. It was really good, and nice to relax for the day. Sunday was a nice day at home hanging out with my parents. We flew kites, played sidewalk chalk, and just generally had a good day.

This past week flew by pretty quickly as well. We spent a couple evenings finishing up Emma's science fair project for school. Her project was "How do flowers drink water?". She really enjoyed working on it and was so proud of it. She was excited to bring it to school and show it to everyone.

Friday evening was Emma's play at school. The play was a Mother Goose Comedy and Emma had a couple little parts in the play. She was "Sidney" the goose, and also the cow jumping over the moon. She did a really good job and it was super cute to watch. It was also a book fair night, science fair night, and a supper. It was a busy evening

On Saturday, we packed up and headed to Mankato. The kids traveled really well, and we got to Mankato around 1:30pm. We hit up Schmidt's meat market, and then headed to Sibley Park to let the kids burn off some energy. Rachel and Elena met us at the park, and all the kids had a good time playing and looking at the animals.

After the park, we ate supper at a Mexican restaurant that was delicious. It was awesome. We spent the rest of the evening just visiting and then eventually putting the overtired kids to bed.

On Sunday we celebrated Easter and Elena's first birthday. Most of the extended family was there, and it was nice to see and visit with everyone. It was also Mankato clean up days, so we walked around and checked out people's junk at their curbs. We found Emma a new bike, and Elliott a yellow bat and ball. It was kind of fun to watch all the people with trailers going from house to house.

We pretty much spent the day sitting in the driveway, soaking up the sun, and drinking some beer. The kids had such a good day playing with everyone. They did not want to leave. We left around 5pm and didn't get home until 8pm. It was a late night for everyone, and everyone was so tired and pretty much went straight to bed once we were home.

It was a great weekend, but we were all happy to be home once we got there.