It was a wild and crazy holiday weekend for the DeMoss family! Liam got to spend a lot of grandparent time due to day care being closed the majority of last week and got his first multi-night over stay down at my parents. For those of you who don't know, I'm from a rural town in Southern Iowa, and when I say rural, I mean RURAL. My hometown is one of those that if you blink you'll miss it traveling on a main highway and oftentimes growing up I would have to find the next nearest, biggest town to tell people where its general location was.
Although I'm totally a city girl now, occasionally I like to go back and spend a good, long day there enjoying the open, country fresh air and see the livestock and of course have our annual Fourth of July celebration at my parents house. I remember growing up it would very much be a huge event my parents would put on. My dad would grill, and my parents would invite our neighbors and closest friends and their families to come and celebrate. It was kind of like a potluck, people would bring side dishes, chips and BYOB, and they'd swim in my parent's ginormous above ground pool(RIP). There would be sparklers, snakes and other 'kid friendly' fireworks and once it got dark the real show would begin.
At the time fireworks weren't exactly.....legal in Iowa, but somehow the trip to Missouri would always be managed, and my dad would put on a good show.
Then all of a sudden it stopped for some reason or another. I imagine people got busy, lives changed and people moved away from home until a few years back I pleaded for my mom to bring back the family tradition and I would help her host it(with the help of my best friend) and now here we are.
I didn't mange to take any photos that day after chasing around a two-year-old and helping set up, but it was an amazing time. My cousin Travis made a brisket and his brother Jeff made pulled pork. There were chips, salads and lots of other goodies to graze on. Just right before the fireworks Hubs made a fire, so the kids could make Smores, and then it was time for Hubs and Ben(my Bestie's husband) to start the show.
My Bestie and her husband LIVE for the fourth of July, so much so that they have a yearly budget allocated to splurge on fireworks. Needless to say, they did not disappoint this year, and even Liam enjoyed them as we sat up on my parent's upper deck and watched them. After the fireworks were done it was bedtime for bonzos, and we tucked Liam in before heading back outside to help clean up after the party.
We ended up spending the night at my parents house in my old bedroom(one of them, at least) and woke up fairly early to head back home. The rest of Sunday was spent basically hanging out until later that evening when we went over to a friend's house to grill hamburgers and shoot off more fireworks. I think by that time Liam was done with fireworks and wanted to be in his dad's arms because he was starting to get a little scared of the noise(to tell you the truth I really don't care for the loud ones). I ended up taking Liam inside and he cuddled on the couch with a blanket to watch Scooby while Hubs and K-Bear finished shooting off fireworks.
Needless to say, after two jam packed days of running around, we were ALL ready to go to bed. Liam had no trouble going right to sleep, unfortunately our dog was a little too anxious from all the big booms going on outside, so we spent at least a couple of hours snuggling her and letting her know it was going to be okay. That's the only downside about the Fourth of July, each year animals and soldiers who suffer from PTSD have to bear through the festivities. I would like to say people are respectful with shooting off fireworks, but like most situations there's always a few bad apples that shoot off way too late or aren't courteous enough.
Since Daddy had to work today and Mama had it off, I decided to take Liam on a fun day. So after breakfast we met up with one of Mommie's friends from when she worked at the credit union and her little boy to visit the Blank Park Zoo. We ended up getting a membership a few months back after he enjoyed it so much and being as we live basically down the street from the zoo figured it was a good investment. We opted for the Family Plus package which allows us to bring two guests of any age with us(we figured it would be a good deal if we take the grand parents or Liam's cousins with us).
It honestly is a good little zoo to spend the morning or afternoon at and they have so many exhibits that kids of all ages could enjoy seeing. They even opened up the Giraffe feedings, Camel Rides and Train rides after Memorial Day(as well as the Australian exhibit that was closed for a minute).
Mondays are 'Member Mondays' which means that we could have brought an additional guest and we get our first train ride free! We didn't know this at the time, but our guests can ride the train free as well! When Liam first saw the train he kept pointing and saying "Choo Choo Train!" He was super excited to get on his first train ride; however, he didn't like the waiting process in the long line...nor did he like getting off said Choo-Choo Train.
We ended up wandering around for a little while longer(trying to advert the toddler tantrum and failing dismally) Even the tortoise and the tiger exhibit couldn't get this little guy's tears to turn into a smile until we pushed past into the seal exhibit and saw the Giraffe's(I offered to take Liam to feed a Giraffe, but he told me 'No' so we moved on). We did manage to get Liam to crawl into the shell to pretend to be a 'turtle', which was probably part of the reason why he was unhappy with me when I told him it was time to move on.
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