Uncle John, Auntie Melissa and Cousin Michael made a recent visit to the frozen tundra. They live in DC, and come to visit every year around this time, so we were all thrilled and filled with anticipation awaiting their arrival. They stayed in the cities for a few days and came to our house - we played with toys and more toys, had a fire (on purpose) in our backyard and made s'mores which I think might have been the first time for Michael. We went to their hotel and all went swimming and played in their room with, you guessed it - more toys.... 
This is during the big 'smore' event. Michael wasn't as interested in chocolate or marshmellows as our kids were...
Then they headed down to Nelson to stay with Oma. We followed on Wednesday of that week and stayed until just after they left on Saturday.
This picture was taken in the morning looking down towards Wabasha - usually you can see the bridge over the Mississippi and the city of Wabasha - but the clouds had the city all socked in. It was a really cool site.
We went to the Eagle Center in Wabasha - it was way cool! They have six live eagles there, plus awesome displays and not to mention the great view of the Mississippi River.
The kids put their heads in this eagle display - it lasted about 5 seconds.....
The view of the river was pretty fantastic too.
We also headed to the toy store in Kellogg for carousel rides and to play.
Cailin and Michael spent a lot of time together. Andrew would sort of float in and out, but overall, would do his own thing. Cailin would try and tell Michael what to do and Michael would try and tell Cailin what to do - it was a perfect set up.
We went to Alma to climb the big, big bridge over the railroad tracks. The kids wanted to see a train go by, and they waited and waited. They waited more patiently than the adults did until finally we pulled them away to head back for dinner with friends that were expected to visit.
The kids waited and watched. We were assured that there would be a train because we had heard that there are like 37 trains that pass under this bridge every day. So we figured the odds were with us that if were here for an 1/2 hour, that we'd see a train. The only train we saw was one parked on the side of tracks in a siding. The big topic of discussion with the kids then was "why is that train parked there? is it broken?"
We said our goodbyes and the kids were very sad to see their buddy Michael leave. Andrew kept asking "mommy, when do we get to see Michael again?". We told him we hoped really soon! 
