Unexpected Turns of Events

Chloe has woken the past two mornings complaining of a very sore throat. It subsides a bit in the daytime, and comes back with a vengeance at night. On this, the third morning of her complaining, we had "Nurse Deb" take a look, and she thought we should take her in for a strep test. Chloe, our die-hard shopper, did not want to sacrifice shopping time, but also didn't want to feel lousy any longer. So Tom & Leah headed over to the Mall, while Chloe and I went running all around Bloomington, Minnesota, looking for an urgent care center that was open on a holiday-weekend Saturday. (If you ever need one, make sure you check on the hours before you follow inaccurate Google Maps instructions, and waste a good hour and a half of your vacation time!)

To make a long story short, we secured some antibiotics for the sick child, and arrived at the mall at 1:00 p.m…only 3 hours after it opened! Originally we had hoped to leave the mall by about 2:00, but could already see that wasn’t going to happen.

To add to our turn of events (this one a much happier turn), Tom and I had discovered via Facebook that our good friends Brian and Jill S (from North Carolina) were visiting Brian’s sister in Minneapolis! We were able to arrange a last-minute lunch at Hard Rock Café and thoroughly enjoyed catching up with these dear friends.

After several somewhat hectic hours of shopping (when has it NOT been hectic for us at MOA?), we finally headed out of town around 6:30 p.m. Since Jared, Seth and Maddie had already arrived at our cabin at the lake, we knew it would be fine to arrive after check-in time, and counted on the adult kids to pick up a few groceries for our Sunday morning breakfast. After a quick fast food supper in Brainerd, we continued our new tradition (started last year) of singing “You Make Me Smile” by Uncle Kraker with the girls. I got out my laptop and recorded the first three days of our trip. I’ll close my laptop now, as we approach our final destination…Cass Lake, Minnesota…where Eagles Soar (and so do our spirits!)!