July 4th and Tyler's Blessing

July 4th is always a big weekend in Prescott. It's one of our favorite holidays of the year for all that goes on in this town. This year it was particularly special because we blessed Tyler on July 3. My entire family was in town for the festivities and the blessing. Me and the boys spent most of the week before the 4th in Phoenix because Kristen flew into town. We did a lot of shopping, relaxing, swimming and messing around.

The plan was to return to Prescott fairly early on Friday, July 1 but while we were getting ready to head out, we both got texts that Brad was in the hospital with appendicitis and was going to have surgery. That put a huge damper on the rest of the weekend's plans. We stayed in town until Friday evening so we could see Brad after his surgery. Poor guy. He did alright with everything but it sure bummed him out and has changed all of his plans for the next several months with his ODS and starting work at Naval Reactors in DC. Brad and Amanda did make it up to Prescott on Saturday and stayed like planned until Tuesday, which we were so glad about.

The weekend activities started very early Saturday morning with the annual 4th of July parade. The YMCA gymnastics program does a float every year. When Grant learned about it he decided he wanted to be in the parade. We had to be there at 8 AM even though the parade didn't start until 9 AM. My mom and Kristen came with me and the boys. Chad passed this year on the parade. My mom and Kitty took Cole to find a spot and I waited with Grant. Originally, I was going to leave Grant to walk with the other kids but then I decided I wasn't comfortable leaving him alone so I walked with him. By the time our turn to start in the parade came around it was well past 9 AM and getting hot. Grant made it about 15 minutes into the parade route before saying he was hot and tired and wanted to go back to my mom and Kitty. That was fine with me. He was able to hand out a few little gold medals to kids along the route and had the fun he wanted. We headed back and watched about half of the parade before getting way too hot and plenty of candy. At that point, we went to the Square for the annual fry bread. Because the parade wasn't over yet the line was reasonable and we got the fry bread quickly. Chad met us for lunch.

(Grant standing next to his friend Katie, from his YBL basketball team)

On Saturday night we all went to the rodeo. It was fun but crowded and a bit warm. Grant enjoyed it for the most part. Cole was just tired and restless the entire time. Their highlight was the root beer floats they got. Grant says his favorite was the horse drags where the cowboys have to pull themselves onto the horses.

Sunday was Tyler's blessing. As usual, it made me cry to listen to Chad give our little boy a blessing. In the circle was my dad, David, Brad and Marcus Rogers. After church, we had lunch. Sarah and Marcus came over with their kids and they brought Max and his girlfriend with them. It was great to see Max. We hadn't seen him since before Cole was born. We always love spending time with Sarah and Marcus. The kids had a great time running around the house and outside.