In Which We Have A Day Of Fun

Today was the big day of festivities out on the lake!  They do the big celebration a day early here because there are so many other celebrations in the area on the holiday proper.  Things started off with the annual golf cart parade.  We thought Connor would enjoy watching the golf carts decked out in all their finery, but since the parade was in the middle of the day and it was nearly a hundred degrees outside some maneuvering was required. 

Connor doesn't have sweat glands, and he overheats really, really quickly in hot weather.  So we planned ahead and parked a car out on the golf cart route an hour or so before the show was supposed to begin.  Then we drove down there in the golf carts when it was time for the parade, and Connor, Jeremy and I sat in the air conditioned car while everyone else watched outside.  It took the little guy a bit to perk up because the ride over was still pretty hot even with the wind blowing in his face, but by the time the parade was halfway over he had recovered and seemed to enjoy himself.

After that the little guy cooled off in the swimming pool with his grandmother and aunt while Jer and I took the waverunners out for a spin.  While the traffic on the lake was pretty sparse compared to prior holidays (no doubt due to the ban on swimming caused by the Blue-Green Algae Of Death) the water was still really choppy and we didn't go very fast today.  It wasn't the big waves that were the problem-- they weren't any bigger than what we'd see jumping wakes-- it's the fact that there wasn't a break at all between them so we didn't really have any time to recover between jumps.  I hit a couple of them just the wrong way and rattled my teeth a bit, and I think I'll be pretty sore tomorrow, but it was still a ton of fun. 

This evening the lake held its huge fireworks display!  We took chairs out to a hill overlooking the lake and sat down to enjoy the show.  First they had a small airshow with various historic planes.  Connor was completely uninterested in that, but he did enjoy watching all the boats maneuver into place out on the water in preparation for fireworks viewing.  Then there was a short break, and since it was still a little warm outside we threw Connor in the golf cart and went for a refreshing drive to cool him off.  He absolutely loves going up and down the hills and I'm relatively sure if he was able to he'd try to sneak the golf cart home in his luggage.

We sat back down in our chairs and waited for the fly over.  I was a little worried about how Connor would react to the F-16 fly over as I remembered it being really loud in previous years, but the little guy hardly even noticed the planes because he was too busy being excited about how the wind was really picking up.  I'd forgotten just how quickly the weather can change down here.  Within ten minutes the wind was so strong that all of the boats started being pushed across the lake and some major traffic jams happened down there.  Boats ran into each other, into docks, people swimming (despite the Death Algae) were left behind as their boats drifted away from them faster than they could swim. . . it was chaos out there!  Police boats formed a ring around the firework barge to prevent boats from drifting in too close and ramming it.   Soon we could see lightning out on the horizon.  It was quite the show!

Connor thought the wind was hilarious.

Luckily things mostly settled down by the time the fireworks show was set to begin, though every once in a while we could see lightning in the distance.  This is the first time Connor's ever been awake for a fireworks show, and he loved it!  He kept signing "More light!  More light!" and kept his eyes riveted on the sky.  They're able to set off the fireworks much earlier here than they can up in Washington because it gets darker here sooner.  So he didn't even really stay up much past his bedtime.  I'm glad his first fireworks show was such a spectacular display too; they really do put on a beautiful performance here.  Jer's aunt took some pretty cool pictures of the fireworks and one of us enjoying the evening, too.  Doesn't it look like we're in a wind tunnel?

The little guy is much too riled up to sleep now, of course.  There's a thunderstorm going on outside, which he's not used to hearing because we don't really get them at home very often.  Maybe he thinks the thunder is more fireworks!

~Jess