Weekend Recap (and #2 of Summer Bucket List!)

Ahhhh...a lovely Summer weekend, drawing to a close. It was a long weekend, but it doesn't really feel that way - it just flew by! We had a great weekend and a fun holiday - I hope you all did too!

I worked late Thursday night, so my weekend didn't really get going until Friday. (A side note - Linnea came home on Thursday evening. Jeromy kept her up until I got home (I work until 8:00 on Thursdays), which was REALLY nice. That girl is absolutely the sweetest. HUGE hugs and giggles, and "Mama...Mama...Mama!!" over and over. It was good to be together again.

On Friday we woke up and got ready right away so that we could get going to a 4th of July parade!! I've wanted to go to a parade for a long time - and it was definite must on my Summer Bucket List. Parades were a big part of my upbringing, and I couldn't wait to introduce Linnea to the joy of parades. Many times with things like this I make the mistake of setting my expectations way too high, and end up feeling a little disappointed. As anyone with little ones in their lives know, things rarely go as well as planned. However, I'm happy to report that the parade exceeded expectations!

Linnea and her flag dress

We made our way over to the parade route early, knowing it would be busy. My heart sunk when I saw that it was busier that I had expected. We parked in a nearby neighborhood, and made our way to the route to stake out a spot. Thankfully, we TOTALLY lucked out. We found a shady spot in the middle of one of the side roads. We saw that people were starting to sit in the middle of the then open side roads, and decided to follow suit. We found a nice shady spot, and set out our stuff, hoping that we wouldn't have to leave. Not even 5 minutes after sitting down, a police officer came to officially close down the road! Yes! A few minutes after that, our friends Jackie, Tom, and Gavin came to join us.

Linnea and Gavin, ready for the parade

Linnea did great, even though we had to wait a little. There was enough activity to keep her entertained, and the spot stayed pretty cool in the shade. Before long, the parade started. It was very cool because they started the parade with old military vehicles and many, many war veterans. It was humbling to see all the men and women who had served our country. I love watching Linnea stand up and clap and wave to the vets.

The parade was awesome. A good mix of community groups, bands, and fun. Linnea absolutely LOVED it. I loved watching it through her eyes. She loved clapping and waving - she seriously waved for a good half of the parade. It was so sweet. Another cool moment of the parade (at least for me!) was getting to shake Senator Amy Klobuchar's hand!

Hooray for parades!

When it was 11:20 or so we figured we better get going, since we were wanting to get to Jeromy's parents in Somerset by Linnea's nap. Since the parade seemed to be winding down, we headed out to beat the traffic. We made a quick stop at home to get Luther and our swimsuits, and headed over to WI. We got Linnea down for our nap, and then I actually ended up taking a bit of a snooze as well.

When Linnea got up we went for a dip in the pool. It was a bummer because by that time it had gotten a bit overcast and cooled down. It was fun despite the weather.

Happy Little Fishy

Hanging out poolside

After dinner we headed home. I regret a bit that we didn't try to do fireworks with Linnea, but I think they might have freaked her out a bit...maybe next year.

On Saturday the weather was beautiful. We decided to have a little family geocaching outing. Jeromy scoped out a nice park down in Burnsville for us to explore. We found a few geocaches, and of course had to hit the playground. We grabbed some lunch on our way home and headed home. Linnea took a nap, and I went to Old Navy (only found a few things for Linnea).

Piggy back ride while geocaching...

We found a bunch!

 Linnea must have been REALLY tired because she slept until around 4. Earlier in the weekend, our friends Thatcher and Melissa invited us over for dinner. We decided to hit the wading pool by their house before hand. We got there a bit later than planned, because of Linnea's long nap, but we still had a lot of fun. I'm glad that Linnea's been more into swimming this year than last. I really hope to get her into swimming lessons in the Fall/Winter.

After a bit, we headed back to Melissa and Thatcher's for a delicious dinner and nice conversation. It's so nice to have friends with kiddos the same age - it's fun to watch the girls become friends, and it's always nice to have people who understand the ins and outs of toddler parenting!

Wading Pool Fun

By Sunday, we needed a little bit of a slower day. So we hung out in the morning, getting stuff done around the house (laundry, clean up, etc.). Late morning we decided to go to Costco to stock up (we hadn't been grocery shopping in nearly three weeks - our usual is two weeks or so, so we were hurtin'). Since we finished around lunch, we grabbed pizza for lunch, and then headed home.

Jeromy went out to do the rest of the grocery shopping, while I stuck around home for Linnea's nap. The rest of the afternoon was spent just hanging around at home - a nice, slow finish to a very busy weekend. It was pretty hot and humid out, so we played in the basement and watched "Finding Nemo."

After Linnea went down for bed, I took Luther out for a walk. I have been having a really hard time motivating myself to be active since my miscarriage, which isn't like me. I can't even tell you how long it's been since my last run, which is really not like me. So I gave myself a kick in the butt, and I'm glad I did. It felt good to move, and the scenery was just gorgeous. We had a great weekend - I hope you did too!