We bought our plane tickets months in advanced and counted down the days until take off. St. Paul's, Minnesota was the setting of the Mighty Ducks movie, and our destination. We spent weekend nights, after playing Wii, watching all three of the sequel we couldn't get enough of. We looked up the specific locations where they roller skated through downtown and went to the roller coaster in the Mall of America. Our Mardi Gras seemed so much less important than being able to stand where Charlie Conaway, Gordon Bombay, and Adam Banks stood, and experience a few other things. We planned to stay a total of 5 full days there and pack them full with activity. Pre-trip we shopped for winter clothes. I even bought these snow boots that were so much on sale; considering we live in New Orleans where snow doesn't exist except in movies. We were packed and ready to check our bags. Izzi wouldn't let us forget her fascination in airports, and how especially excited she was for the Atlanta airport. On the plane I got so claustrophobic and nervous. The worst part was take off. After about 10 minutes I adjusted. We realized we had TVs in front of us. Instead of actually having to pay for a movie, we decided to play the free game. Trivia questions popped up and you had to be the first one to choose the correct answer. After 8 questions the game placed you in order of first to last. We figured out that the opposing players were others sitting on the plane with us. We began searching for those few people who would steel our first place slot. I still remember eating from a little health food store when we arrived in the Atlanta airport, and how huge the airport was. We played on the parallel escalators and raced each other. We arrived on a Saturday evening exhausted from our, two flight, lay over, trip. We grabbed a taxi, and headed straight for downtown. Our hotel was right across the street from the Target center where the Timberwolves basketball team played. Inside, it got even better, Starbucks was directly attached. That night we walked next door to Hard Rock Café for dinner. Izzi asked for sweet tea, the waitress looked at her like she was crazy and said "That's a southern thing." Mrs. Sherry had to explain that not everyone puts sugar in their tea. We got back to the room, and made a game plan for the week. Monday we would go to the Mall of America, Tuesday we would go to Mickeys dinner and 2 of the parks from the movie. We planed Wednesday for our second day at the mall. The rest, we would decide later. We started our days early, not to waste any time. Monday morning, we walked to catch the bus and realized it was on a certain schedule. We had to wait 20 minutes for the next stop. Standing there, a lady came out of no where picking up trash. We realized she was alone and wore really shabby clothes. We had a conversation with her. She got on the same bus as us, with one destination, to the Mall of America. When we got there she stayed on the bus, to return exactly where she came from. It was a little dose of a humbling experience. When we got to the mall we literally could not stop standing in awe at the ginormous view of the mall. Words can't even describe the color and size. It was built in a circle. The center was the Nickelodeon Universe. Filled with roller coasters, a carousel, a Lego world, and all inside. We were so happy that we could finally take off all of our layers, and not freeze. I took a picture with my cousins favorite nickelodeon show cartoon character from the Backyardagains, Alphonso. I immediately made it my Facebook pro-pic so everyone knew exactly where I was that day. We brought the Nikon camera every where we went to insure we took a snap shot of everything we encountered. Along with our phone pics we captured every memory. We decided to do half a day of rides, half a day to shop. Halfway through the day we rode almost every ride, and decided which were our favorites. At this point we had to get to shopping. They had every store my little heart could have desired. We all bought matching Minnesota flannel pajama pants and sweatshirts. We shopped until we dropped and headed back to the bus. We knew we would need at least one more full day here. When we got back Izzi's dad, Mr. Jay, flew up because he couldn't get off of work to come with us. As we walked back to the lobby there was a guy at least 6'7 standing to check in. Izzi's dad walked up to the counter and stood next to him with all 5 nothing feet he stood. We all couldn't help but bust out laughing at the height difference. We knew immediately he must play basketball. We got in the elevator with a man who was with the tall guy at the counter. He confirmed our suspicions and said he was the coach of his team, the Indiana Pacers. The Coach gave us some basketball advice, since we played ourselves. The next morning we went to a park, which turned out to be a lot less exciting then we thought. The stairs that the team, from the movie, skated down was so covered in ice we could barely even see the top of the side railing. We ate lunch at Mickeys dinner where one scene from the first movie was filmed. I still remember reading the menu of how many famous actors had sat, and ate there like Arnold Schwarzenegger. The next thing on our list was the hockey game. We got ready, and took a taxi downtown. We bought Minnesota Wild sweatshirts, and got settled in our seats. I think we found more fascination with the guys sitting two rows behind us; and the cutest little blonde baby boy we took pictures of, then we were the game. We slept in the next morning and visited one more park along with walking around downtown. Next on the list was ice skating, but we didn't have the energy so we went back to the hotel and slept. We saved all our energy for the mall the next day. I was ten times more excited for the second trip to the mall and knew exactly which rides to go to first. We repeatedly rode the Bikini Bottom drop that had a 90 degree angle drop; and that was the whole ride. Another ride we went on was a ghost busters, buzz lightyear, type ride. You shot the ghosts. We thought it was a train so Izzi and I got on one cart and Megan got behind us. A few seconds later we turned around, and Megan wasn't there. When we exited we got out and waited for her. As she came out she was holding the fake laser guns to her head, and we all died laughing. We didn't return to this ride. Once our brains were so boggled in our heads, the park was closing. We found a movie theatre, and bought tickets to see 'I am number 4.' We discovered the seats were 3D interactive. They moved with the action parts of the movie. In one scene, the actors were talking in a garage. There was a button on the seat just to make it jolt once. I kept pressing Izzis. At first she didn't think anything of it. After a while she blurted out, "why is it shaking?! they're talking in a garage!!" I confessed, and we all started laughing so hard. We returned back to the hotel, and the next day was our flight home.

We took our first flight to Atlanta. In the Atlanta airport, we chose a random sit down restaurant because we had a while before our next flight. Suddenly we herd singing. We turned around and sure enough, there stood an Elvis impersonator jamming to 'Hound Dog.' I knew this trip would never have a dull moment. Sitting in the airport waiting for our flight, I still remember eating our Subway sandwiches; still taking pictures of each other. Mr. Jay offered us ginger chews, which I couldn't pass up regarding my weird fascination with gingers, the red heads. I still remember listening to Justin Biebers 'Down to Earth' at night looking out the window as we landed in New Orleans. I saved that piece of candy for almost a year. It took me about a week to get used to not waking up next to my best friends, getting Starbucks, and bundling up to go play in the snow.