Frozen Minnehaha Falls

"Mom, are we on the blue line?" This is the all important question coming from the backseat four year old copilot.  Whenever we travel anywhere beyond Walmart, Ethan gets his very own printed out map from mapquest showing we are 'a' and we are traveling to 'b'.  That way I can reply with "No, we are still moving down the paper".

On our way to see Disney on Ice, we decided that we'd make a day trip of it and see Minnehaha Falls frozen over.  The temperatures that day were in the low 30's so it wasn't too cold out for a brisk walk.  The steps leading down to the falls were gated off because nobody wants to shovel five stories of steps for the tourists these days.  It was fine because I had Eleanor in my Sleepy Wrap under my coat with two little boys itching to make a run for it after the hour and a half drive down to the falls.

I am a 'falls' lover.  If you ever see a minivan half on the road half in the ditch with some crazy lady taking pictures of water trickling out of the sides of a mountain with a almost crazed look in her eye, that would be me.

Hey, at least I'm willing to admit it.

Let's start with Cheeks McGoo over here. 

Here is a picture of her in post-milk coma. 

She is wearing: a onesie, fleece pants, fleece shirt, fleece coat, alpaca wool shoes, and a hat.  After being bundled and snuggled to me, we kept each other mighty warm.

Brotherly love.  Ethan is instructed to hold Ernest's hand whenever we are a.) in a parking lot or b.) walking on ice and mom's hands are full.  That day we did both and they both saved each other from slipping. 

 Win win baby.

On the other side of this wall there is a mega drop because the river runs underneath this bridge

(aka: "inquisitive slippery toddler death pit").

  "Hold on to him!"

The guys. 

 The boys doesn't stick around me too much whenever dad's around.  That's okay, us girls like to have our own time together thankyouverymuch.

The falls are beside Ethan's head.  There is a mega drop beyond that fence.

See my red glove holding Ernest's head.  If I can't look directly at him, I'm going to hold him by the head to make sure he doesn't try to go all Houdini on me.  (Note: I still can't believe I have three kids.  Wow.)

Throwing snowballs over the sides.  Those rocks are great barriers if there is no snow for anyone to step up that brings them up to if not higher than the top of them.

Minnehaha Falls in early March. 

Isn't it gorgeous?  The puffy part is the actual falls.  The icicles are just leftovers that froze.  I'm sure there's a super cool technical term for it but I'm not thoroughly educated in the field of "frozen water fall".  Give me a few more winters out here and I'm sure I'll have a masters in it.