Welcome to the Twin Cities Blog-trotters

Hello All!  Thanks for visiting, we are being featured on Blog-trotting today. 

We have been living in Minnesota for just a little over four years now, so I am an Iowa girl at heart!  Since moving to the Twin Cities, I have called it the "secret city of the Midwest".  I grew up just four hours from the cities and had no idea how much Minnesota truly had to offer.  Most people think of the Twins, the Vikings and...... THE MALL OF AMERICA when they think of Minnesota.  But really there is so much more going on here!

This year is the Twins inaugural season at Target field and I have been just itching to get to a game!  The season is coming to an end soon, but I still have high hopes of making it to a game. 

However, my husband and I keep pretty busy with our "Minnesota Twins," at least that is what my dad calls them.  Meet our little ones Dylan Tyler and Carter Benjamin.  They will be two in October and are full of energy.

A good rule I believe a lot of Minnesotans follow is to avoid The Mall of America, especially on the weekend!  However, I find myself there a couple times a month.

Minnesota is also known as the state of 10,000 lakes!  It seems like everyone either has a cabin or has an aunt's cabin, a friends cabin, or a cousin's cabin that they visit at least once a summer.  So on the weekends we have "cabin" traffic.  All this sounds fun, but I have yet to spend a week on a Minnesota lake...maybe someday.  

I have participated in a couple of these fun downtown activities.  Lawn Bowling at Britt's Pub and the Pedal Pub.  I would highly recommend an evening with both.  There are lots of fun bar and restaurants to visit downtown, uptown or in St. Paul. 

Minnesota is a corporate hot spot, housing the headquarters of many major corporations:  Best Buy, Target, 3M, Hormel, US Bank, SuperValu, General Mills and many more.  The cool thing about living in Target Corps' backyard is there is basically a Target on every block.  There are two within 10 blocks of my house, and two right by my work.  So every week includes at least one Target trip!

I think the long, cold winters scare people away!  When I moved here I was prepared for the snow and the cold, what I was not prepared for was the length of the winter.  Fall is my FAVORITE season and here, fall feel like two or three weeks in September, then it's cold until June.  

There are a lot of winter fans here because EVERYONE in Minnesota LOVES HOCKEY!!!  The kids start skating here at 2 or 3 and play on hockey teams by 5.  Pretty crazy!  Keith and I haven't jumped on this bandwagon yet.  And we don't mind because ice time is a premium and the little ones have to practice at 5-6:00 am.  

If you don't like hockey, you probably like football!  Favre is back and all the Viking fans are dreaming of a Superbowl!  I'm in a fantasy football league this year, so who knows, I might even get into football this year!  No guarantees.

Thanks again for stopping by, hope you enjoyed a brief tour of Minnesota!  Unfortunately, between work and chasing around our little boys, we don't take advantage of all the great things our city has to offer!  If you have been here or are from MN, please leave a comment about your favorite Minnesota places, so we can add them to the growing "to do" list of places to visit!