4th of July - Part 1 of 3

We had a wonderful day celebrating our Country's Independence. The VMI parade grounds hosted a fun day full of activities. We started the day strolling the craft vendors and Leland enjoyed her first pony ride. She was a little hesitant at first of the ponies, but after petting one she decided she would ride.

There was also a kids bike parade, but we decided to be spectators this year instead of participants. Leland enjoyed watching all the kids on their bikes. One more reason for loving this town... kids who wanted to be in the parade met at the library where they got a pack of decorations for their bike and free water' after the parade they got free hot dogs and watermelon.

We then headed over to the Virginia Horse Center to meet Chuck's sister Mitzi and her family. There was a horse show going on so we decided to let the kids go see some horses. That did not turn out so well. We thought it would be fun horse jumping and such, but instead it was prim and proper Arabian horse competitions. These were some ridiculously serious horse people. I'm usually not a fan of "horse people" because most are fanatics. We were in a huge arena with maybe 60-70 people in there. In the 30 minutes we were there, 2 judges came and told us our children were being distracting to the riders and might spook the horses.

In one competition we watched there were only 2 competitors. TWO??!! How great is 2nd place when there are only 2? Our kids were clapping and cheering. If you are going to compete in anything you should be able to handle some cheering from the stands. I was a bit upset. By the time the 2nd judge came over I was irritated so we left. But not without a few choice words for the judge. [Chuck's note: I was so proud. Ashley told the judge, "That's okay, we are leaving now because y'all have made us feel very unwelcome with your rudeness."]

In the future, we will just stick to the rodeos and bull riding that come to the Virginia Horse Center where they encourage yelling and cheering.

After lunch and naps we headed back to VMI for more fun. We started with the bounce houses. There was a slide, obstacle course, and 2 that you just jump around in. The 1st time down the slide Leland did fine, but scratched her wrist on something. So the 2nd time she was more nervous. She sat at the top for a while then finally went down on her belly. Poor Tara (almost 2 year old neice) was in the obstacle course when it started to lose air and collapse. Luckily they had workers inside to help and he got Tara out. She was so nervous getting in but didn't seem to realize what was happening so she wasn't traumatized.