Living it up in Colorado: July 2010

July 4th started out as just another day. We piddled around the house, lit some smoke bombs and spinners in our alley, tye died some shirts... originally they were red, white and blue, but when we washed them, the red took over and made the whole shirt pink with a little white and blue. We followed the directions, but apprently the red is just too dominant. The rest of the day was spent getting ready to go to Windsor Lake to watch the fireworks. Every year we pack a picnic dinner and head over around 6 or 6:30 PM. Harrison and I always want to swim in the lake, but since it's usually starting to get dark and cooler outside by the time we finish dinner, we don't get a chance to swim. So this year Mama decided we should go earlier and be able to play in the lake. We dressed in our swim trunks and tye die shirts, packed up the towels and the picnic stuff and headed out a little before 5PM.
When we got there and staked out our spot - near the beach so Harrison and I could swim and play in the sand. We wandered out into the lake, up to our knees - but it was too cold! The clouds were beginning to roll in and the wind had really picked up. So Harrison and I decided to dig a big hole in the sand for shelter from the wind. We had done this before with Daddy in Hawaii and made a hole wide enough and deep enough for Harrison and I to sit in and be sheltered from the wind- we were a lot smaller then! We found a bucket and began digging, the sand was rough and chunky - not like the fine sand of Gulf Shores, Alabama.
Our Friend Tyler showed up and helped with the hole - but the clouds just kept coming, the sky got darker and darker - we abandoned the digging to quickly eat dinner. After dinner we lit some sparklers and packed up our stuff in case the storm came our way. Just as we finished packing up the torenntial rain and fierce winds forced us to make a mad dash for the car. The car was close by, but by the time we go there, we were soaking wet and dripping. We waited for about 30 min. and decided to abandon ship and head home. The drive home was a little scary - we could hardly see in front of us.
The rain didn't let up for hours, I'm glad we weren't sitting in the car that long! We tried to find fireworks on TV - but there weren't any. At 9:00 Mama checked the Coloradoan website and found out the Windsor fireworks were a GO! So we piled in the car - luckily we had put our rain coats in the dryer when we got home - with hats, cloves, raincoats, glow lights and sparklers too! When we got to Boardwalk park there was maybe 100 people standing on the side walks with umbrellas and rain coats waiting for the show. It finally started at 9:50 - the fireworks started off slowly with one about every 5 minutes... every once in a while they would pick up speed and get the rhythm going and there would be 10 or so in a row. The Grand finale was a good one with lots of color bursts. Again, we were water logged and quite sleepy as we made our way to the car. All in all it was a good 4th with good friends!