Mom and Ben weekend

Grandpa Jim offered to take the kids for the weekend (THANKS GRANDPA!!), so Tyler, Matt and Grace went over to Daglum.  Ben was planning on having a sleepover with his friend but that fell through, so he stayed home with me (Rich is working midnights so he's been sleeping during the day).  We decided to have a Mom and Ben weekend and do a few fun things just the two of us.  The first evening we went to "How To Train Your Dragon" and to McDonalds for dinner.  Then today we went for a drive to do a little research for Ben's North Dakota project.  He's going to build a reproduction of a keelboat, which is the type of boat Lewis & Clark rode up the Missouri River.  There is a big keelboat repro. down by the river you can climb on, so we started there.  Then we drove up north to the Lewis & Clark Interpretive Center.  We didn't find any information on keelboats, but had fun looking at the other stuff!  We had a picnic at a table there too.  Then we decided to drive back to Bismarck and go to the library.  We rounded off the evening at Applebee's with Dad and a trip to Blockbuster.  I think Ben would like to be an only child :).  It was a nice weekend....the weather kind of stinks, but I'm happy to report that my tulips are coming out!  Rich said there's a chance of snow tonight, and I think I'll have to murder someone if that actually happens.  NO SNOW!

                                  Ben ordered the Big Breakfast with Hotcakes at McD's this am.
                              He ate almost the whole thing too :)!!