Festivities

The past two weeks have been filled with lots of swimming, biking and reading. The girls lucked out when we ran into friends, Lily and Violet, from school while visiting Lake Elmo park. We also found some new swimming holes on White Bear Lake. Birch park and Chautauqua park seem to be our new favorites. We can bike to both easily. We had to give up our old favorite, Willernie beach, this year because the lake is too shallow with the lack of rainfall. Thank goodness we can bike further distances and the City of White Bear is working to make a bike trail that goes all the way around the lake. Next year we will have access to the downtown and all the beaches using the trails. Over the weekend, Erin and the girls attended the Swedish Maypole activity at a farm in Scandia. We toured all of the historial buildings to learn how the Swedish people lived when they first came to America. The girls were fascinated by the story of the Tomte told by one of the historians. Erin was impressed she got to stand in the oldest functioning church in Minnesota. The church was made with no nails and the boards were put together in a Lincoln log like fashion. Following our building tours, we participated in a variety of activities. The favorite activity seemed to be making flower crowns with wildflowers. Coming in a close second was running with the metal hoops followed by milking the cow and wringing out clothes using an old fashioned tool. Everyone was impressed by the amount of Swedish we were hearing families speak as we passed by different groups. We had to leave the Maypole ceremony a bit early due to rain, but we got to hear the Swedish National Anthem and some songs in Swedish.

Unfortunately, the Canadian wildfires have made it hard to breathe outside for the last week, so we have had to make due indoors. We walked at the indoor ice arena and found some free bowling tickets for kids to pass the time. Hopefully, the ash won't last all summer.