The Fourth

We love the Fourth around here - it is steeped in tradition for our family and it was a fun one once again. We traditionally always go to a pancake breakfast, see my grandma (as it is her birthday), and spend time doing some kind of fun activity with the Zarcones.
This year my parents invited us to their ward's pancake breakfast (as they always do) and we accepted and got up bright and early, dressed the family in matching t-shirts, and made our way to the park to eat some yummy pancakes and such offerings at the breakfast.They also had some activities, including a sack race. The kids lined up and Jasmine begged to be a part of it. We agreed that she could do it and Abuela took her and got her into a sack. She actually did pretty well, although she didn't win and she let us know she didn't when she walked back over to us. She said, "I loosed". It was cute and a huge reminder to us about how competitive she is.Lorne declined doing the Elder's Quorum race but when they called for the women, I told Lorne I would do it because I wasn't scared of making a fool out of myself. Of course, secretly I was setting out to win the race. I am a bit competitive myself. I had to do the race in bare feet inside the sac because I was wearing flip flops but nonetheless, for being out of shape, having a baby 2 and a half months before and being barefoot, I came in third and almost could have won. I got tripped up on some rocks and then got behind but for a good clip I was leading.After the breakfast, we headed into Arlington to visit my grandmother on her actual birthday. She was so happy to see us and we had such a nice time together. She got to hold Ava for a while and Jasmine was super excited to sing Happy Birthday to her Abuela Meme. It was a sweet moment. After all that fun we headed back home to meet up with the Zarcones. They had never been to Mount Vernon and we decided it was high time that they visited good ol' George's home. It was also convenient as it is so close to our house.We had lunch there at the food court and then we decided we needed to make our way into the line for touring the mansion. It is the main attraction so if we got nothing else done that day we were going to see the house Georgie lived and died in.We passed by the green and they were having a demonstration and so we paused and took some of that in - Ava was a bit frightened of the gunshots but she did ok with it all.While we were standing in line, we saw George Washington himself, and took a photo with him. He was very nice and welcomed us to his property. Then Ava had a bit of an accident. She had a blowout which leaked onto her cute 4th of July dress. I had to rush her to the bathroom and did my best to change her and clean her up and then a very kind lady held Ava while I hand washed her dress in the sink so it wouldn't stain. This is why you may note a costume change in the pictures of Ava.
After touring the mansion, we walked around the property, paid our respects at the tomb and took a look through the museum.After this we were all quite hungry again and decided to head up to National Harbor to eat and check out the fireworks. We ate at a great Italian buffet which I will be visiting again sometime and we relaxed and chatted and ate a nice dinner. It was great because there weren't many people there as they had had their celebration the night before.
At around 9 PM, we walked outside and were happily surprised to see many many sets of fireworks across the river. We could see at least 5-6 celebrations going on at one time, including the DC fireworks. It was really neat and we didn't have to go through huge crowds to see them!
That concluded our evening with our dear friends and we said our goodbyes and headed home, ready to wait another year until the fourth comes around again and we will find more fun things to do.