Minnesota: Coolest Celebration on Earth

Landmark Center, St. Paul

Friday I played a bit of hookie, left work early and headed to downtown St. Paul to take in the sights, the smells and the sounds of the 2011 Minnesota Winter Carnival. Let me just tell you, Minnesota does not disappoint!

The paths of Rice Park were lined with donated trees and the smell was heavenly of evergreens and mini donuts. Hmm mini donuts... Trees were strung with lights and even thought it was chilly Minnesotans were out enjoying the 'Coolest Celebration on Earth'.

The ice carvings were gorgeous. It was only day 2 of the winter carnival but many of the sculptures were about eighty percent completed. Bestie and I even snagged a few pictures on the thrown. The thrown was solid ice and so beautiful, and upon sitting it makes your bum wet - that is your warning for the day and my good deed of the year. Let me tell you wet bum, chilly wind & twenty degree weather is an interesting combination.

We passed Linus & Lucy playin' some tunes and strolled over to the Landmark Center and paid our two buck-a-roos for Wells Fargo Winter Skate.  Two bucks was well worth forty-five minutes of ice skating fun. Wells Fargo Winter Skate is a yearly 6-8 weeks of fun but not tied in with the Winter Carnival at all. But a lovely bonus!

After freezing our bums we headed out to meet with the rest of our posse Kristi. It worked out so well since Kristi works in downtown, unfortunately most restaurants close by evening so we had to find a different location for dinner but we had a wonderful time, lots of girly chat. I love girly chat.