Monday, July 4th, 2011

Happy 4th of July everyone!  ONLY 5 DAYS UNTIL OUR WEDDING!!

Our weekend started out to be a very sad one as we drove to Waukon, IA and attended the funeral of Elizabeth's grandmother, Laurayne A. Easley.  I only had the pleasure to meet her once, but it sounds like she was an amazing woman.  She was a teacher for well over 40 years, and her marriage to Donald Easley was a few weeks shy of lasting 69 years.  It's pretty amazing to have such a long marriage.  If Elizabeth & myself can make it to our mid-90's we'll be close to that!

For the rest of the weekend we tried to have some fun around Palatine in efforts to cheer up.  Yesterday we went to a carnival and enjoyed some good food, listened to live music, rode a few carnival rides, and later in the evening sat and watched the fireworks show.  Here are a few pictures just in case you don't believe me:

Elizabeth enjoying some freshly grilled sweet corn.

The corn was dipped into a vat of melted butter.  Mmm!

These kids must have been in middle school, but they were playing some RHCP songs pretty well.

Elizabeth going down a kiddie slide!

Ferris wheel.

We bought wrist bands to go on unlimited rides. 

On the ferris wheel.

While riding the ferris wheel, here is the view of the roller coaster that just goes in a circle.  We managed to survive that one as well.

Looking down at the festival below.

Enjoying a cold beverage before the firework show begins.

Ok, it's kind of hard to capture a 20-minute firework display with a few pictures.  There were some very nice fireworks that looked like smiley-faces, but I wasn't able to get a picture of any of them.  It was definitely fun to watch though.

So far today we've gone to the mall to pick up some things for Cancun and some gifts for the groomsmen in the wedding.  For lunch we made Jucy Lucy's (hamburgers with cheese on the inside), and they turned out amazing.  I may never grill a regular hamburger patty again. 

I'm looking forward to seeing all of our friends & family back in Iowa here in a few days.  Can't wait!!!