Memorial Day Weekend

Friday night, Ricky's company had paid for tickets to a baseball game for everyone that wanted to go.  It was a neat idea but it turned out to be a very cold and blustery night!  So crazy for the end of May, none of us were expecting that.  We, and the kids had a lot of fun anyway though... On the way to the game:

It wasn't a Phillies game but she looked too cute in her baseball cap :P

The company had paid for box seats for everyone, which included a meal and drinks.

Notice the winter coats?!  It really was sooo cold!  We were only able to make it until the 3rd inning before we were all too cold to stay any longer.  There were going to be fireworks after the game so we were sad to have missed those but we did stay long enough to get cotton candy for Ricky, um, I mean the kids, it was for the kids...

Hee hee

It was a big hit.  I only let them eat half of those things before I made them put them back in the bags.  That stuff is crazy messy!

Katy must have been saying something funny here:

It was a lot of fun but so cold.  We had taken winter coats and blankets and just couldn't take it after only a couple hours.  It probably didn't help that it was in the 90's just a couple days before that!  We didn't get home until 9:30pm though and the kids were exhuasted.
Saturday morning was really blustery but we did get some work done around the house anyway.  My Brother-in-law came over in the morning to grind the stump that has been in our yard for almost 2 years now!  It's so nice to have that taken care of finally.  I'll get pictures of it in the next post that I do.  Saturday evening the wind had finally calmed down enough for us to go out fishing.... It was a very nice evening and we all had a good time.  Joanna was obsessed with finding seashells on the seashore and found a lot of them too!  She filled her pockets with as many as she could.

Katy was into collecting "shells" too, but really she was only collecting rocks :P

 Chase caught 3 fish this time and Ricky and I caught 2 each.

We took our great adventure dog, Bolt, along too but she wasn't really into adventuring that day.

Sunday morning we went to church and then left to drive out to Gettysburg for the day.  We stopped for lunch....

We got there and quickly realized that everyone else had had the same idea for that day.  All of the parking lots were full full full!  We finally found a parking spot and walked down a nice little road to the visitor center.

Joanna finds treasures wherever she goes:

We walked all around the museum, which is very well done, and then went in for the movie and cyclorama experience.  Katy wasn't able to make it through the whole movie but she did sit on Chase's lap for a little bit which was adorable!

Joanna was very concerned that I was taking a picture right after they said not to take flash photography :P

with the great Abraham Lincoln:

We had visited the gift/book shop before leaving the center and Katy got a flute:

on the walk back to the car:

It was a very pretty day

The kids had a really good time and it was amazing to see how far we've come and how much things have changed in only 150 years.  We drove around through some of the battlefield areas and then stopped at this wax museum where there were reenactors with tents set up.  I got distracted by this lady making lace by hand and didn't really get to see the other tents.

She was quite the character.  Notice her ashtray?  She said they had all been camping out in their tents since Friday night.

They had a whole timeline set up starting at the revolutionary war all the way to the Vietnam war...

Chase liked the miniatures of course:

Oh look! I found flowers to photograph! :P

Ricky and I needed a rest on a bench near this pond.

"Fourscore and seven years ago our fathers brought forth upon this continent a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as the final resting place of those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this. But, in a larger sense, we cannot dedicate, we cannot consecrate, we cannot hallow this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember, what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us, the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work that they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us, that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they here gave the last full measure of devotion; that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain; that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom, and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth."
President Abraham Lincoln, at the dedication of the cemetery at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, November 19, 1863

On the way home we decided to stop at "Chickie's Rock" and take in the view of the Susquehanna river.

I had never been here before but it was really pretty and a perfect evening for enjoying it.

Joanna actually took this picture for us!:

dancing on the rock:

It was such a nice day.
Yesterday we went to the park with the kids in the morning.  Ricky played baseball with Dominic and Chase and I watched the girls on the playground.  When it was time to go I decided to walk home with Joanna and enjoy the beautiful weather some more.  Joanna was so interested in all of the flowers and trying to learn all of their names.  She even noticed that one of the gardens had Ibiris just like in my garden!  After nap time we all went to our fishing spot again and had a lot of fun there!  Ricky and I each caught 5 fish, Chase caught 4 and even Katy caught 1! It was so funny!  They must have been hungry because we were catching them on almost every cast!  In the evening we had a cookout and dinner on the patio and then sat around the fire talking and doing races with the kids in the backyard.  It was such a lovely day/weekend :)