4th of July

Cory and I thought it would be nice to do something special for 4th of July, so we decided to take an eight hour road trip to visit my family in Wyoming.  It turned out to be really fun. We had a fun time eating a 4th of July BBQ at Lacey and Chris' house.   

After dinner, to burn off the calories, Rhiannon and I engaged each other in an epic lightsaber battle!!!

My Jedi skills were clearly superior...until she entered an insatiable rage that matched even my talents and abilities....

She ran me up the tree...and then I surrendered.  Later Lacey also asked Cory to model some of her hair accessories...and I graciously agreed to help in some of the poses.

I told her she looked like a hippie...loved it.

We then set off the fireworks we had, which mainly consisted of sparklers, and smoke bombs.  After we were all done, my dad decided we needed to buy more because it wasn't as exciting as he wanted it to be I guess.  So we head to the fireworks stand and go inside and he starts to buy more smoke bombs and such, and then he starts going for the big stuff.  I asked if we were going to go outside of town to shoot them off because it is illegal to shoot off the bigger one in town.  He kind of mumbled something and bought them all.  

When we got back to the house we proceeded to set them off.  With the risk of getting a fine slapped on us if a Police car happened to drive by, the adrenaline was pumping.  We set off a few fountains that went a little higher and were a little louder than we expected but it wasn't too crazy.  We then set out our last box, which said that it was a twelve shot show, and that it "shoots flaming balls and lights".  We figured that was what all fireworks do, so we didn't think much of it.  We were wrong...oh so wrong...  We lit the fuse, only to hear a *BOOM* and see a ball of light shoot hundreds of feet into the sky.  I was thinking in my mind, "oh no" when I heard the second boom, and started to scan the sky for the second ball...it wasn't there...I hear the third boom and look down, only to see a flaming missile shoot into the neighbors yard and go out.  The box had tipped over after the first shot and was now shooting fireworks in all directions.  It was a little like Russian Roulette because after each shot, the force of the explosion would spin the box around until it faced another direction.  It didn't take us long to realize this was bad as another shot hit a neighbor's window.  I looked at the box around the 7th or 8th shot and realized it was pointing directly at us. We all started to scatter, with some hiding behind cars and others running to the house.  As I was running to the house, I heard the shot go off and whiz past me only about a foot away.  It hit Rhiannon's little camping chair and went up in flames and smoke.  By the time it was all over, Ebin and Rhiannon were scarred and angry that Grandpa would set off fireworks like that even though it was illegal.  Overall it was a pretty funny experience.

During the trip we also took Cory on a trip to Yellowstone National Park.  It was just us two and my parents on the trip.

It was a beautiful day, and we saw some great sights.  Here we are at the Upper Falls overlook.

We also got up close and personal with some buffalo.  My mom warned Cory that the first time she saw a live buffalo she would probably "crap her pants".  I don't think it was that traumatic.  

We also got to see Old Faithful erupt...after about two hours of waiting.  It is supposed to go off every 50 minutes give or take 15 minutes.  Well, it wasn't very faithful...

Overall it was a fantastic trip for the two of us.