We Love A Parade...

Ok, the 4th of July holiday is now a week behind us, and I'm just now getting around to posting the rest of our weekend pics on my blog. When I got to the lake on Saturday about 1pm, the dock was in full swing with preparations for the 2nd annual July 4th parade contest on the lake. Apparently last year a couple of the boats on our dock were in the contest, but this year they decided to band together and decorate just one boat from Pier 14 to participate in the contest.

I was busy visiting with my sis and our friends from out of town, so unfortunately I didn't get any individual pictures of anybody or of ALL the work that went into the boat for the contest... but you can see just from the couple of pictures below that they were over the top with all their decorations!

The theme of this year's event was "I Love A Parade", and Karen, Dave, Mel, Holly, Jim, Charli and Susie and Wayne (and several of Karen/Dave's family members) went "all out" on their contest entry!! Mel and Holly were king and queen on the front of their boat (you can see their thrones, below- apparently they weren't seated yet when we took the picture), with a marching parade on the top of the boat, complete with trombones, trumpets, drums and Susie even pulled out her majorette costume! Jace got to ride on the top of the boat during the parade with Karen/Dave's grandkids, he had a blast!

While we didn't join in and ride on the boat with them during the parade, we did take our boat out and watch all of the boats as they went by... The parade had about 15-20 boats in it, but it was really no contest this year, they were the winners hands down! And when they received the $500 prize from the marina owners, the group graciously donated it to Susie and Wayne's international adoption organization.

We had friends Lucas and Shawn down from St. Paul, although by the time I got there on Saturday Lucas was catching a cold and soon headed back to Springfield to fly out the next morning. But we did get a few hours to visit, and take the boat out for a bit. And they had already enjoyed a fabulous couple of days with Dave, while I was in Poplar Bluff.

I was so happy to have my sister Ann and her boyfriend come and spend the afternoon/evening with us on Saturday, before they headed back to Kansas City Sunday morning. Ann lives in North Carolina, and she and Matt do amazingly well with a long distance relationship. Although I hear that there may be murmurings of Matt making the move out to the coast in the next couple of years... :)

Anyway, they were down in Branson with Matt's family on vacation for a couple of days, so she didn't get to make it to Poplar Bluff for the Gasaway family gathering. But she did head over to Kimberling City and hang with us for a few hours. And, they said they'll definitely be back for a longer weekend-- enjoyed their time on the lake with us.

So that was our holiday weekend, and then I came back to work for another solid week of freakin' budget revisions. Thank god I'm almost done, my last revisions are due in about 40 minutes and I finished early and am eating lunch.

Looking forward to another fun weekend, starting tomorrow. Dave is having a client and his wife down to the boat, along with his boss, a coworker and their wives. I've met his boss and coworker and wives, but am looking forward to getting to know them better, and to meet his client/friend and wife.

And then one of my best friends, Gail, and her hubby Dan are coming down on Sunday for a few hours, and will hang with us and Dave's client/wife. Gail's bday (39 and holding, hee hee!) is Saturday and her folks will be in town, so she will be able to leave the kiddos with Grandma and Grandpa and join us for their first afternoon ever on our boat! I'm so looking forward to that, and to just a little relaxation, and NOT worry about my budget for the first time in three weeks! (sigh of relief)


Cheers!