August 16, 2013

Peeps pop up at Mall of America

Editor’s Note: The Peeps Store is permanently closed.

Remember when Peeps would be in the stores only at Easter time?

Then, Peeps started popping up during other holidays – Christmas, Thanksgiving, Halloween, Flag Day. Ok, not Flag Day, but who wouldn’t buy a package of red, white and blue Peeps? Right?

Well, I found a place where you can get Peeps any day of the week (except Christmas, of course). Peeps has a store inside the Mall of America in Bloomington, Minnesota. When I learned of it, I told Lisa we had to stop at the MOA and see the store.

It’s been about four years since we’ve been to the Mall, but I would have been OK not stopping at it this year…until I learned about the Peeps store.

There are three Peeps stores in America – Bethlehem, PA, New Harbor, MD, and at the Mall of America.

The store has Peeps clothing for sale, in addition to stuffed Peeps, pens, writing pads, key chains, magnets, and, of course, the candy. My God, the candy! Yellow Peeps. Purple Peeps. Pink Peeps.

In addition to the Peeps, the store – called Peeps and Company – has Hot Tamales, as well as Mike and Ike. A store employee was handing samples of Mike and Ike treats while we were there. While tasty, I was really hoping for some Peeps samples. No such luck.

We picked up a couple of souvenirs for the daughters there (no candy. I paid the price for that when we got home).

Since it had been a while since our last visit, we wanted to check out as much of the Mall as we could since we only had a few hours before closing time.

Lisa badly wanted to visit the Lego store. So, after spending our time at the Peeps store, we headed over to the Lego store.

What a store! The number of Lego pieces and the kits available were enormous. So many things that can be built with those tiny pieces of colored plastic.

While Lisa was in the store, I stayed outside to take some pictures of the Lego models on top of the store. A helicopter with guys rappelling hangs from the second floor rafters. A sabertooth tiger stalks prey. A Roman soldier fights against a giant creature.

While shooting the pics, a woman laughed. When I looked her direction, she told me she was glad she wasn’t the only geek taking pictures. We chuckled. Apparently, her friends took off to other parts of the Mall because she was taking so much time taking pictures.

I met Lisa in the store. It was huge. And interesting. She had a nice time.

A friend of Lisa, who used to work with her at American Express, lives near the Twin Cities and asked if the two could get together at the Mall. We met up with her. They caught up with each other over a cup at Starbucks. Always nice to see old friends in new places.

Later, Lisa and I walked through the Nickelodeon Universe. We checked out the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle ride. The ride apparently spins as its goes in circles.

We also checked out the old Paul Bunyan log chute ride, which is now simply called the log ride.

Rugrats are the focus of kiddie bumper cars. Dora the Explorer is the old ferris wheel.

One ride we found really interesting was the SpongeBob Square Pants Rock Bottom Plunge. Riders’ cars go straight up several feet, then drop almost straight down then off as a roller coaster.