Children's Museum

We went to the Minnesota Children's Museum today up in St. Paul. The kids have been asking to go for months. Today ended up being Target Free Sunday, and we didn't have anything going on after church, so it worked great!
We were nervous that it would be packed (being free and all). There were signs posted in the parking garage asking you to leave your stroller in the car because of the number of people on the free days. We were pleasantly surprised to find that although it was busy, it wasn't much worse than when we've been there on a normal day. We haven't been to it in a while, so there were several new exhibits for us to check out.

Fun day Sunday!

Easy Breezy Voting

I took Ray to speech class today and had a hard time finding a parking spot as I hadn't realized that the school where he has speech was a voting place for people in that neighborhood.

On our way home, we stopped at our voting place. It was really easy and fast! We got in line behind about 5 others (would have been none in line if our last name started with M-Z). Took a few minutes and then got our ballot. In all, it only took us about 15 minutes total.
Way better than I was expecting :)

I've had this Obama song in my head all day

Election Eve

Why am I so nervous about the elections this year?

Sure, I really want Obama to win and don't want to go through the weeks of depression that seemed to occur in '04 when the country voted to keep Bush. But its not like I'm out there campaigning or volunteering, so I don't have much personally invested.

Or is it the anxiety of not being sure just how much time I need to plan to vote tomorrow. I will have Ray and Greta both with me when I go to vote, so I'm really hoping the lines aren't going to be as bad as they've been showing for the early voting in other states. I don't want to stand in line for an hour or more with such little ones. Maybe I'll bring a bag of books and snacks just in case.

Or maybe its knowing that I'll be glued to the computer and TV tomorrow waiting for any sign of Obama pulling ahead. It's going to be a late night!

P.S. Ray's preschool voted today. Their results had Obama winning. The teacher said that the class results have been pretty accurate over the last few elections. (I was surprised when we asked Ray about it that he was able to name both presidential candidates. Amazing how much they pick up).
Maria's school also voted last week and had Obama. But Lincoln appears to be a very liberal school. Hopefully the little ones are reflecting the opinions of their parents and we'll see the trend continue tomorrow.

Trick or Treat

Halloween was so much fun this year! I think it was that the weather was so mild so we didn't need to rush back home to get warm like most years. We were able to take our time and Greta was able to stay out too.
We did notice that we bought way too much candy to give away as there weren't as many tricker-or-treaters as in past years. I wonder if that was because it was a Friday, so people had bigger parties to go to?? I was expecting the opposite because the weather was so great.

By the way, I made the Dorothy costume :)

Singing Songs

Raymond has been learning some Halloween songs at preschool and has been singing them to me today :) It's so nice to have him sing as he's usually not a singer.

MOM

My mom stayed with us for the last week and a half. It was so wonderful to have some extra help, and it allowed me to have some time away from Greta which was good for her to get over some of her stranger anxiety. I was able to volunteer at both Maria and Raymond's schools without Greta along which was way more productive :)

Thanks so much Mom for all your help this past week. We love you!

Kieler Parade

We went home to Kieler this weekend for the annual Fire Prevention Parade. It is always so much fun at the small town parades. Since it was raining, Greta went to Oma and Opa's house. Maria rode on Grandpa's float with Grandma and Madeline. Ray got to sit with Mom and Dad and collect the candy (way too much candy!!!)
It was fun to see lots of relatives and friends this year.