Wisconsin Part II...The Bombs Bursting in Air...

Next up in the Wisconsin festivities were fireworks and the July 4th celebration. Now, I am a dual citizen...Canadian and US...and while I cheer madly for Canada at the Olympics, appreciate the way we do healthcare and if I had to choose would probably stay in Canada, I do have to say (among many other wonderful things) that the States put us Canadians to shame at their country's birthday party. This year was no different and the firework presentations were awesome.

These pictures were taken July 4 although we did get to see fireworks the day before and enjoy time with friends from the EFree church my family attends there. For July 4th we headed back to Riverside park along Wisconsin Avenue and had great seats for the show. Something different this year...a young woman say the national anthem before the show began and there was patriot music playing during.

The kids loved the fireworks except it was pretty late for them. At one point Liam said, "this is really neat but I want to be in my bed right now!" Thankfully he was able to wake up a bit on the ride home so that he could enjoy some mini fireworks courtesy of my aunt and uncle on their drive way. No, they don't stop celebrating at the park. I think Canadians would be surprised to see so many shops selling ONLY fireworks. Sometimes I think Canadians could take some patriot lessons from the our neighbours to the south.

Wisconsin - Part One

I just sat down to do some blogging about our trip to Wisconsin and I realized there was really no way to do it all in one post. We just had too much fun and did too many things. Actually it was a great mix of fun and relaxation (thanks to the Witters and Reiss').

The first couple days we were able to spend with Logan (my cousin, home from Madison where he is studying Electrical Engineering). We went to the famous Riverside Park in Neenah. Probably not that famous but it is special to our family. My Oma used to play in the park as a child with her siblings as they lived very close. Wisconsin Avenue borders one side of the park and that's where the wonderfully old and massive houses are. People at the turn of the 20th century moved from New York to start paper mills in the Fox Valley area and my great grandmother worked for one of these families as a cook and my great grandfather as the chauffeur. I just learned on this trip that my Oma (my grandmother) worked as an upstairs maid when she was young. The house is now owned by a single doctor but he is trying to sell it. I would LOVE to go through it to see what it's like but I'm sure they don't just plop an open house sign on it every Sunday. :) Anyway, across from these houses is the park and they've got a great play structure. We had lunch one day and let the kids play for a while. Another day the guys had some fun in the backyard with the sprinkler.




Logan just hanging out with Libby and watching the fountain. He is GREAT with the kids and it was so special that he came home for that weekend.


Liam "driving" the group of us around on the moon rover. As you can tell the ride was a bit scary!