Charlottesville - July 4th!

On Friday, July 2nd, we threw a weekend's worth of worldly goods into the back of our SUV and drove to Charlottesville, VA to meet this super sweet gal:
She was surrounded by this entourage:

And we had a F-A-H-B-U-L-O-U-S time. Seriously. A weekend just full of laughs and we loved every minute of it!

On the way, we stopped in DC at Fairfax center to have Chipotle with Uncle Bill. Mmmm!! I was trying to see if Michael noticed that Aunt AK was missing so I asked Michael, "Hey...is Uncle Bill missing someone? Who is usually with Uncle Bill who is not here now?"

Michael thought.

And said, "GRANDPA! Grandpa is usually with Uncle Bill."

Not quite. But probably correct...I think Grandpa is usually around when we see Uncle Bill!

We arrived late Friday night in Charlottesville, had a good chat, and went to bed to prepare for our Saturday!

Woke up, checked out the Charlottesville City Market downtown (they are big about eat fresh/eat local), and strolled a bit through their little downtown area. SO cute! Had lunch at Revolutionary Soup and then headed out to see Monticello.

Michael and Charlie played all in Jefferson's gardens, which were gorgeous!

Then, we took the family tour of Monticello, which was great! Highly recommend that! Monticello is incredible because the architecture was just so beautiful! Inside and out. And it was neat to see his inventions incorporated into his home. And also a whole wall full of Indian headresses and tomahawks. SWEET.

Michael slept through the whole thing but woke up in time to do this for our family picture: NICE SON. All the chairs and trucks were setting up for the citizen naturalization ceremony they do on the 4th of July.

Brian wanted to strike a pose on the lawn. Again, CLASSY: At least you can say he looks strong!

And because I just like this picture:
Afterwards, we had barbeque with some biting flies eating us alive and went home for an early evening! Then Amy and I ran off to watch Eclipse and left all the kids with the boys! I can't say we regretted it but we were absolutely thankful that they let us do that!

Sunday, we went to their, as Andy calls it, "Rock Band Church." And it certainly was! Michael went to the class they have for children during church and I sat there thinking, "Now tell me why Catholics don't do this?!??!! This is great!" We can pay attention in church and Michael is happy too!

After church, we drove out to Blue Mountain Brewery where we enjoyed some beers, bar food, and gorgeous mountain views!

Went home and almost the whole house went down for a 3-4 hour nap. Sweet. MY kind of vacation!

All this in preparation for seeing the fireworks after 9pm!! Here's our little blanket spread. Can you see who just came back from Europe and doesn't really have lawn chairs?? We got some pizzas, had some watermelon, and had a fantastic picnic!! It was so fun to let the boys run around and so American to get to watch fireworks on July 4th. It was Michael's first time! And there was this older girl who was about 9 years old who basically distracted the boys from antagonizing each other and in turn babysat our kids!! It was fantastic!

Michael LOVED the fireworks and Charlie kept coming back to tell us that, "The fireworks look like they are coming right down on you but they don't!" And then Michael came and got me and said, "Do you want to come sit with me and this nice girl?" Well, of course! And then I started to get nostalgic because one day, he'll actually ask me this and the girl will be his girlfriend.

Here's a fireworks picture. Because I want to:
And I leave you with this picture, which is my favorite of the weekend. My favorites are rarely ever anyone else's favorite. But I love it because it is so American Summer to me:We left Monday morning and were so thankful for a great weekend with wonderful friends who helped make this 4th of July such a great one!

Love,
P