A Fabulous Fourth

Wow, it has sure taken awhile for me to recover from all the activities the past few weeks.  Besides that, John has been working a lot of closing shifts so I've just been drained at night - but time for some catching up!  Let's start with giving some highlights of our Fourth of July celebrations!

I can hands down say that this year's Fourth of July was my favorite yet.  It was awesome that John was able to rearrange his schedule so he didn't have to work.  It was nice that we could have a lazy morning as a family since the party we were going to didn't start until the afternoon.  And it was the perfect summer day after a ton of hot and rainy weather we'd been having.  Bonus is that the kids are getting older and can fend for themselves a little more!

Some holidays are really easy to explain to a 3-year old but for this one I described it as the "Red, White and Blue Party".  We picked out coordinating outfits, painted our nails to match and we were set!  On the way to the party in Eagan we stopped off at John's parents to wish them a happy 4th, drop off a cherry dessert and get a family picture taken.  I'd say Megan's spirit comes through in this picture!

We had a blast at my aunt and uncle's place and the kids could play outside.

 

My uncle grilled hamburgers and brats and there were lots of fixings for them.  John cooked up a couple s'more pies for dessert and they were a big hit with the crowd!  Megan enjoyed the ice cream cones!

After dinner there is always some daylight to kill before fireworks start so my uncle takes everyone to a nearby elementary school and launches off model rockets.  He's been doing this for years but we hadn't gone lately just because of the kids.  But they were perfect angels that night!  Not only were there rockets but kites to fly and water balloons to launch!  My uncle asked that I take some candid pictures during the outing - be careful what you ask for, Uncle Jon!

I love this picture of Owen and my Grandpa Gennrich!

 

 

 

 

I think this is the best picture of my parents that I've ever taken!

The lovely ladies on the hill!

Both Grandpa and Grandma got an item crossed off their bucket list!  Neither of them had flown kites before!  Thank you, John, for passing on the kite to them!

Megan asked so politely if she could do the honors of launching a rocket.  She waited patiently in her hippo chair as my cousin launched the first one but she got to go second!  Here she is with my Uncle Jon loading the rocket.

 

All geared up - safety first!!!!  Five, Four, Three, Two, One.... Blast Off!!!  There was a little button to push to eventually shoot off the rocket.  John got it all on video and we have one proud little rocket launcher!

We were able to stay for a long time but we could tell that Owen was soon ready to get going.  We drove back to Waconia, planning on watching the fireworks from home again.  I got Owen put to bed but then Megan and I sat in the opened up trunk of the Prius and John put on a private fire cracker show for us in the street!  Then when the city's show started we went up to the hill.  All except for the mosquitoes that finally made an appearance during the fireworks it was absolutely perfect and we all had a blast!