Second year Day 203 - Thursday July 4, 2013

First thing this morning, Mark headed up to the church to cook for the annual Fourth of July breakfast.  Arrianne and I went up about 9:00, as she was asked to sing the Star Spangled Banner, like she did last year.  Stephany and Tyler stayed at home with Bridgett.  Arrianne's singing was beautiful as always.  After that we headed right home.  Dave had said that he would follow us up to the breakfast, but never did show up to go with us and we left late.  When we got home, Tyler said that they had just come over (like 45 minutes late) and said they were headed up there.  So, we missed them.  I called Dave and he said that Jackson and Elodie were also wanting to come and asked me to give them directions, which I did.  It ended up that they couldn't find a close parking place, so grabbed lunch at Burger Town:).  It's been really hot here and we've turned on the air conditioning several times this past week already.  Usually we don't resort to air conditioning until August, but this summer has been weird all around.  It got unusually hot early in the summer, then cooled down and now it's hot again.  Anyway, at least we have an air conditioner, so that's a blessing.  Scott, Jaclyn and Weston came out today.  I am still amazed every time I see Weston at how tall he is getting!  He will be passing Arrianne soon and then or course, he will pass Stephany and I not long afterwards.  He turned 11 in February, so he is getting to be quite the young man these days.  He knows everything about basketball it seems!  He can tell you who plays for who and how long they have played, who is the best at everything, etc.  He knows so many basketball trivia facts that you'd be amazed!  He knows a lot of other sports facts as well, but since basketball is his first love, that's what he knows the most about.  Mark spent a lot of time taking everyone on the boat for tubing, skiing, wake boarding, and just plain riding.  We had hamburgers and hot dogs for a very late lunch (everyone was at the lake and just didn't come up until they were STARVING).  Later on in the evening we made kabobs, which everyone enjoyed as well.  Of course, the brownies were especially good at the end of the evening.  Scott and Jaclyn left about dark.  Then, even though we have had a couple of years without this, the neighbor down the bay started his fireworks off his dock.  A bunch of boats were in the lake to watch.  Usually we take our boat out, but this year we didn't.  Bridgett had just gone to bed when the fireworks started, but fell asleep even with the noise.  This guy put off professional fireworks for about one hour--amazing!  He used to do about an hour and a half.  I mean, these are every bit as good as a city display!  It's fun to just sit on the couch and enjoy them from inside, although I really love watching from the boat.  However, since I couldn't go out in the boat anyway, it was nice that everyone was in the house with me.  Really, Mark had been on the lake a bunch this week already, and then after the morning up at the breakfast, he was beat and just too tired to go out.  So, it all worked out just fine.