Our Fourth of July Weekend

Ahh the Fourth. One of my favorite holidays. Sunshine, activities on/in/adjacent to the water, grilling out, and fireworks. Sounds pretty perfect to me (if you ignore the oppressive Florida heat, overwhelming humidity, and bloodthirsty mosquitoes). The Hubs always works on the Fourth (and this year the day after, too), but we usually find a way to enjoy the pool and a delicious dinner before the festivities begin.

But not this year. This year it rained. It rained a lot. All weekend. The monsoon rain started on Friday around lunch time, and I knew that all my plans for festive fun with the bambino before the Hubs made it home from work were not going to happen. Pool time and her first taste of bomb pop would have to be postponed. No biggie. We would try again on Saturday.

No. such. luck. It has rained every damn day since Friday. Nasty "tropical" kinds of rain. Thunder, lightning, and, you guys, just so much rain. In fact, as I type this post, it's raining. And there's more coming tomorrow.

The Fourth started with a festive breakfast. A patriotic waffle. I thought the kid would devour this -waffles are practically the only breakfast food she'll eat. But the cream cheese and strawberry jam, two things she loves btw, really threw Z for a loop. She ate the banana and blueberries, but insisted on her usual waffle toppings - lightly buttered with cinnamon. So I ate the festive waffle and it was delicious!

It wasn't long after breakfast that the clouds rolled in. So we treated the day like every other, hoping that tomorrow would be sunny enough to hit the pool. We got a little punchy...

The Hubs grilled burgers in the rain, and we enjoyed these yummy drinks, and had strawberry shortcake s'mores for dessert. (Grilled poundcake topped with Hershey bars, toasted marshmallows, and sliced strawberries. So amazingly wonderful!)

And although the rain had finally stopped, we decided to skip walking over to the bridge to enjoy the fireworks like we do every year. We figured the humidity hanging in the air would make them tough to see so we kept Z up late and watched some of the Macy's show, dancing along to the music. (Sorry for the poorly lit shot. Such amateur hour here! Jeeze!)

We took another shot at holiday fun on Saturday, and by Sunday, I was going stir-crazy. So between storms we went to lunch and stopped by Jupiter Inlet to run around before the rains started up again. Zoey loved watching the boats and jet skis run by, and of course, all she wanted to do was walk back and forth along the jetty.

On the short ride home, I'm talking ten minutes tops, the Nothing rolled in (ya, I just hit you with a Neverending Story reference!), and we were trapped in our car, in the driveway while a small tropical event happened around us. Once we made it inside, a festive snack made us all feel a little bit better.

Finally, on Monday, the sun was out long enough for the Hubs to get some wood cut for a project we're working on and for me to set up the kid with her new water table. She loved it, as we knew she would, but after about fifteen minutes, the rain started again AGAIN! It was light at first, so we played with the rock box on the porch, but eventually the porch flooded and we were sent inside, where we stayed for the rest of the day. Boo!

So. Not the perfect holiday I had planned. No pool time, sparklers, or fireworks. The bomb pops are still in the freezer (I'm thinking they're more of an outside treat). It was a mommy blogger fail. But we somehow managed to still have a decent weekend, even if we were trapped indoors the whole time. The rain forced us to slow down and just be lazy - something that doesn't happen nearly enough around here. And the good news is, although its rained 28 of the last 31 days, there is sunshine in the forecast later this week. Hallelujah!