4th of July

Happy 4th of July!

Ever since I've been a little kid, we've done the same thing on the 4th of July (and I love it). We watch the Ishpeming parade on Empire St. with my mom's side of the family. Then after the parade we go back to my Grandma's and have lunch and a little get together with extended family. After that we head out to my Uncle Lowell's camp and spend the rest of the day out there with the Anderson's. This year was no different. And we actually lucked out and had great weather.

Rylee watching the parade. She held 2 pieces of candy (1 in each hand) almost the entire parade. She was so proud of these 2 pieces. She kept turning around and showing me them and saying "2".

Some of the floats threw popsicles this year. Here we are enjoying our cold treats.

I thought this close up was cute, it shows off her big lips too.

Sadie hanging out in Gramma's arms during the parade. She actually slept through the first half of the parade (even with all the sirens and bands).

Our favorite float is the one my cousin Tara is on. Her high school dance team dances on their float every year for the parade. She does such a good job!

Not only did Rylee eat candy and a popsicle but here she is eating a chocolate covered pretzel stick. Usually we try to limit the amount of "treats" she has in a day but not on the 4th. She was loving all her treats!

Sadie just hanging out, looking sweet, after the parade.

After my Grandma's house we headed out to camp. I love having a big close family! It is so nice to see everyone and get together on the holidays. We always have a good time out at Uncle Lowell's camp. Everything is so beautiful out there. Brad and I really miss the lakes and the rolling hills of trees. We don't see that here in Indy.

Funny story. When we got to camp Rylee was so excited and she yelled "water" when we saw the lake. And then she yelled "pool!". I guess this city girl is used to her pools and not lakes.

See, isn't this pretty?!?!

Rylee showing Gramma all the boats.

We got to take Rylee on her first boat ride. She actually was pointing to it and asked us to take her on it. She really liked it!

Another pretty view from the back of our boat.

Brad fishing off the rocks at camp. While we were home Brad and my dad did a lot of fishing together. They woke up early 3 mornings and went trout fishing in the streams. They caught a lot and we cooked them at camp, pretty tasty. Brad loves to fish and misses that too. The pond fishing down here just isn't the same.

My cousin Aaron and Marissa had their baby Addalyn exactly a week after Sadie was born. (I know you can't tell from the picture that Sadie is only a week older but she is.) We were so excited to see them and meet Addy. She is a doll! They'll have fun playing together over the years.

Addy and Sadie (I think Sadie is trying to steal her paci from her).

The mom's and our babe's.

The daddy's and their girls.

This year we went back to my parents house for the Marquette fireworks. My parents live right across the street from the houses that have the view of the Lower Harbor. Their neighbors wer out of town and told us we could use their deck to sit and watch the fireworks. The view was awesome and so was the firework display! They were huge and lit up right over the lake, right in front of us. Very cool! Unfortunatley my camera died and I only got one picture.

It doesn't look that big but if you look close you can see how small the ore docks are and then you realize how big they were.

Our view from the fireworks was so awesome that we had to go back to take pictures early Sunday morning before we headed back to Indy. The lake is SO pretty and you kind of take it for granted when you live there and see it everyday. But after moving away to Indiana (where there are barely any lakes around and its flat) you realize how great the water really is. This is a picture of Lake Superior and some of the boats at the Lower Harbor.

This is another view from their deck. It is overlooking another marina and the big ore loading dock. Wouldn't that be nice to wake up every morning and enjoy coffe and breakfast on your deck looking at this?!

Before we left we got a picture of the girls with Gramma and Grampa in front of my parents house. It wasn't quite as hard to say goodbye this time because we knew we would see them again soon. They are coming to visit us again next week!

The ride home took us 11 hours. Yes it was long but the girls were really good for us which made the trip a lot easier than what it could've been. Once again Sadie slept pretty much the whole way (not kidding, I actually had to wake her up twice to feed her and then she would go right back to sleep) Rylee slept for about 3 hours and then watched a lot of movies, read books, and colored. We stopped at Mackinac City to have a picnic on the beach and to let Rylee run around a little. Again, the views were so pretty! I had to take a few pictures.

Daddy and Rylee

Mom and Sadie

(the bridge is so big, the middle looks so far away in these pictures and there is still another half of the bridge that you can't even see)

So as you can tell we had a great trip home! It was nice to have a whole week off and be able to go to Wisconsin and the U.P. The long drives were definitely worth all the fun times with family!