Fireworks, The Beach, and More Fireworks!

I had started this post on Monday and realized I never finished it.  Last week, I had Thursday (the 4th) off but had to go to work on Friday.  I originally had scheduled Friday and Monday off but due to recent developments, I had to cancel them to use them while I'm off work for the first surgery.  Wednesday afternoon, I left work and met Hubs and the kids at the church to set up for children's ministry on Sunday.  

Calah and Hubs at the check-in desk getting ready to print all the lessons for the month.  Basically, a small tree.

Once we left, we split off for the evening. I took the boys home real quick to get some long sleeves because it was chilly that day/night, and we met "Uncle" Dave (our friend) and Rick (his twin brother) to watch fireworks downtown Joliet.  My phone took HORRIBLE photos of this but thankfully, Rick got one good shot and was gracious enough to send it to me.


My shots:

Rick's shot:

The boys really had a blast.  When they were over, "Uncle" Dave stood up and Jo looked up at him, patted the sheet, and said "Sit down".  He thought wanted the fireworks to keep going.  When I asked him if he liked the fireworks, he said "No!".  I said, "Are you sad because you wanted to see more?" "Yes - ::sad face::".  Two year olds crack me up. 

The next morning, we decided to go to the beach with "Uncle" Dave, Kristen, and a friend of hers, Kim.  It will likely be the only beach visit for us this year because of my surgery, so even though we were tired and had had a late night, I wanted to go.  So, we packed up the car with the double stroller, extra clothes, sunblock, a cooler for lunch, and a boatload of swim floats and toys and headed out to West Beach in Portage.  It's a smaller beach in the Dunes system and you can actually see the Chicago skyscrapers in the distance from there - double bonus.  When we got there, Dave said they were off in an area where there weren't any other people.  Well, it turned out to be true because they were like 1/2 mile down the beach!  I took the boys to the bathroom because I was NOT making that walk again except for when we would head home.  I told Hubs we would catch up with him and Calah, so go ahead and start "pushing" the stroller down to our spot.  By the time we got down to the sand, he hadn't gotten too far.  He stopped to call Dave to figure out just how far down they were.  He and I each took a side of the stroller in the front and carried/dragged it down the beach. I had to take a break because my back was hurting, so Dave met us halfway and helped Hubs the rest of the way.  Needless to say, we were all sweating and tired by the time we got there! 

We ate our lunches right away and then the boys wanted to get in the ice pond water to play.  Lake Michigan is NOT The Gulf - sadly.  It's so much colder but after a while, it felt pretty nice.  Everyone really enjoyed being in the water but all of the water toys kept floating away very quickly so it was a little scary and I had to remind the boys NOT to run after the toys. 

We got home around 5:00, took a quick five-person shower (I thought this was pretty hilarious in our little shower), and got dressed to go to a 4th of July cookout and then more fireworks. 

I got a little bit of sun at the beach that day...BUT my face moisturizer w/SPF did its job!

This was probably the most memorable 4th of July ever.  Once it got dark, the kids were all running around together with their glow bracelets on and they were all very enthralled with the fireworks themselves.  Thanks to all the men and women who serve this country so that our family and friends can have moments like this.