a family 4th

We've had some very interesting weather here lately. Its been unseasonably rainy and I for one, can't believe its already July! Since the 4th was on a Thursday this year, my office decided to close today, which is great. I love a 4 day weekend! Nathan and I had been watching various WW2 documentaries and mini series, which seemed appropriate to finish "WW2 in HD" on Wednesday night. We had a date to Sonic, tried the new pretzel hot dog -- which is delicious, you should definitely try it -- and came home with milkshakes to enjoy during our movie/show marathon. Yesterday, we got up and got ready to go to Nathan's parents house. I took squash and zucchini from the garden (someone at work brought in a TON!) to grill. We got there around lunchtime, discussed what the plans were for dinner and hung out. Nathan and Stephen played the Playstation Move and were thinking about playing some yard games but thennnn the rain started. We had woken up to storms but they were only supposed to be sporadic so it hadn't been raining at Rick and Pam's house. Stephen got out croquet and bocce but it was raining too much and the grass hadn't been mowed due to all of the rain, so we didn't end up playing anything. Between the rain showers, Nathan and I took a walk around the yard. Later in the day we got the burgers and hot dogs ready for the grill. I cut up squash and zucchini, seasoned it and we got the table ready. Rick and Nathan went out to grill the burgers and then it started pouring which then produced some irritation and also some snickering from the peanut gallery. It was quite comical but the weather was less than ideal.  Dinner was delicious and gobbled up very fast.

After dinner we all lounged around the living room and between watching fireworks on tv, several different attempts were made to make ice cream. Pam had made 2 batches of ice cream mixture. One with goat's milk for her and Stephen and one regular vanilla recipe for the rest of us. She didn't realize that she had to have 2 inserts for the indoor ice cream maker so the rest of the family embarked on the basement adventure to find another way to freeze ice cream. First, there was, "no, no, no...we're not making it." and "just forget it". Then there was Stephen saying, "yes, we're going to make the ice cream." Yes. No. Yes. No. Scramble up and down the stairs. Slamming doors. Squabbling in the kitchen. Me? Yeah, well.. I was camped out on the couch snickering to myself as this drama unfolded. Somehow, I looked up and everyone was gone. Between the kitchen and the front porch, Samson and I were left alone. Oh yeah, and Anna was in her room. It was 9:30 pm when this started.

Out on the front porch, Stephen and Pam were trying to get the electric ice cream maker to work. The motor was making a horrible sound which was making Rick mad and causing the curious dog to investigate, which led to a space debacle. In the whirlwind, the front door was open for a few minutes too long. In those few minutes 2 june bugs and a red flying beetle met their end in the living room. It was determined that the electric maker was a "piece of crap" and "that manufacturer needs to get a phone call". Then came the hand crank mixer. Oh my. I think the crank was broken. Enter drill. Turn, turn, turn. Drill broken. Exit drill. Enter socket set. Socket success! Ice cream failure = milkshakes? 

Well...sort of. After all of that, the mixture tasted like the after taste of TUMS or Pepto Bismal. Blech. Everyone else seemed to like it. I guess after all that work, anything would taste good.

Overall, the night was a lot of fun and of course a lot of memories were made.

Samson could have cared less that I was taking his picture