More 4th!

Even our hair accessories are patriotic! What is better than a curly hair girl with curly ribbons? Nothing.

We drove back to Rochester after lunch on the 4th and managed to catch the parade in the next town over. I will always include a parade on my summer bucket list. Lucky for me, every one else was willing to play along!

We are a picnic while we waited and enjoyed the weather. After the parade, we put Gemma to bed and took the big kids to see fireworks with Kaye and Scott. (John stayed home with Gemma. We obviously didn't leave her alone).

The next day, we packed everyone back up in the van and we made the long drive home again. What a wonderful trip! The kids are already talking about next year....

4th of July

Sadly, we had to leave the lake resort on the 4th of July. However, we had other exciting plans for the day!

It's always fun to find something a little festive to wear on a holiday like this one, I made sure to plan ahead for everyone but me! Isn't that the way it usually goes? I don't know of I'll ever find a 4th of July shirt that is more perfect for William. Dinosaur with flag? Perfection. Huge credit goes to John for spying this gem last month while we were at the lake of the Ozarks! You'll notice that William has his staple accessory of swim goggles still.

Boating, v.3

The last evening of our stay, my dad decided he could handle driving a pontoon boat. This was decided after careful observation of several other drivers over the course of dinner that evening. (Pictures of Amelia, Kelly, Gemma from said dinner).

The pontoon ride was a huge hit- almost a month later and the kids are STILL taking about it. It might even be their favorite thing ever.

The hi light for each kid was when grandpa allowed them to steer or "drive" the boat for a short time.

William drove for several minutes before turning to is and inquiring:

"How hard would it be for this thing to do a figure 8?"

We had a beautiful sunset and gorgeous weather for an evening cruise of the lake!

3 kids

I have 25 different versions of this picture on my phone. Not one of them has all 3 kids looking at the camera.

Boating, round 2

Somewhere along the line in our week long adventure, William decided he liked using his swim giggles as an accessory. He only took them off for sleeping.

We also have pictures of Amelia "oaring" and William's true feeling about letting his sister have a turn at anything.

Boating

One of the highlights of our resort stay was the water activities. There were boat and other fun water activities such as water bikes, paddle boards and fishing gear that could be rented.

One fine afternoon, we put Gemma down for a nap and grandma Kim and I took the big kids out in a paddle boat.

I'd like to take this opportunity to thank whoever was the last adult to take ME paddle boating. The paddle paying was about 1000% more work than I recall it being.

My mom and I took turns paddling and the kids swapped turns as well. There was quite a bit of wind as well as other motor boat traffic that made our adventure a lot of work. When we finally returned to the dock 45 minutes later, I was not certain my legs would carry me to our room, which was up several flights of stairs. My legs did their job just fine, but I did require a nap to recuperate. The next morning, I awoke with a pain in the center part of my lower back. Apparently, I was pushing so hard with my legs to paddle the boat, I created a very sore spot on my back.

The following day, the kids were up for more boating adventures. This time grandma and grandpa took them out in a row boat. The kids were thrilled to be in charge of the para for a short period of time.

Amelia: wow! This oaring is a lot of work! I will probably need a treat when we are done!

The row boat activity took about 8 minutes from start to finish.

Then they decided it might be more fun to canoe. Grandma and grandpa were such good sports, they hopped out of the row boat and practically into the canoe. The canoe adventure was short lived as it apparently isn't much fun to be in a boat when someone (William) insists they ARE holding still when they aren't. The canoe time was approximately 5 minutes.

Despite the brief nature of the trips, the kids loved being on the lake and spent the latter part of our drive home arguing about which boat they would ride in again if given the opportunity and who was the better paddler.

Beach in Minnesota

The resort in Minnesota had a beach- it was kind of a hike to get there, but the kids LOVED IT. I think they would have happily played there for days until they were covered from head to toe in sand. We spent two mornings digging, splashing, shell hunting, castle building, minnow chasing, feet burying, footprint making, and moat filling. The kids were in heaven- even William, who sometimes has trouble with scratchy textures.