Summer update!

This may possibly be the longest I've gone without posting. Ever. But in this post you'll see why ... we've been BUSY! Since the beginning of June it's been a whirlwind of many, many fun activities, trips out of town, illnesses, and celebrations. Below is a brief snapshot into the fun we've been having!!

I ran in my first 5k (in the pouring rain, with shingles no less!) with my friends Mandy and Karla. We finished in ~36 minutes which we thought was pretty good--all things considered! And my wonderful family braved the rain the cheer us on!

We celebrated Father's Day! The kids and I made a little photo collage for Mike. We got together with my family in the morning and Mike's family in the afternoon. I was still really sick with shingles then, so I never even got a picture of Mike with the kids. Oops!

We took a tour of Target Field. It lasted for nearly two hours and the kids did GREAT the entire time!

Right after the Target Field tour, we headed to Back To The 50s at the fair grounds. We love visiting Grandpa Dave and Uncle Roger there every summer!

The kids and I are getting to spend Monday mornings with Baby Nora (or "Baby Rona" according to Liam!) this summer. What a treat!

I spent a weekend in Chicago with some of my best girlfriends. It was so much fun to get away with them. We did many of the typical touristy Chicago events ... river boat tour, Millennium Park, Navy Pier, Sears Tower. And we ate lots of great food and had many great laughs. :)

The morning after getting home from Chicago, I joined a few girlfriends to run the Warrior Dash at Afton Alps. It is described on their website as "a mud-crawling, fire-leaping, extreme 5k run from hell." And it basically was. It was a really tough, really hilly, hot, and exhausting 3+ miles. It didn't help that it was 90 degrees and sunny, but we did it! I completed all the obstacles and crossed the finish line smiling and in one piece! My parents are my faithful fans--they were both there again to cheer me on!

We had a fun family afternoon with my parents, Ian, Bre Rose and Nora at the zoo and then out to dinner to celebrate my mom and Ian's birthdays!

We roasted at Eagan's 4th of July parade. In fact, we only lasted on the sunny parade route for about 5 minutes. It was just too hot in the humid 95+ degree sun! We found the perfect spot on a side street -- in the shade -- where some of the floats were lining up to watch. It worked out great!

We did all we could to stay cool! Lounging in the blow up pool in the front yard was about the only way you could be outside.

4th of July fireworks in our neighborhood are no joke! The stuff our neighbors light off is just as fun to watch as the city's big display. So a bunch of us hung out to watch!

After the 4th of July, Mike and I took the week of for a little 'stay-cation.' It was still so hot out that we had to get creative with activities to stay cool. We saw a movie--Madagascar 3. It was Liam's first movie in the theatre. He loved it! It did help that the Madagascar movies are his favorite! We went bowling with the Danielsons. And we spent a morning at Cascade Bay, a local water park. So much fun!!

Next came one of my most favorite annual family traditions / activities -- Pan-O-Prog. It's Lakeville's annual festival and comes packed with so many fun activities that we all look forward to.

It started with the Classic Car Parade. We watched--and melted--with my parents in downtown Lakeville on our prime parade spots (that we had to reserve earlier in the week!). We stayed cool with squirt bottles and were thankful for our shady location.

The next morning, I did a 4-mile run with my friends Karla and Jacquelyn. We ran it in just over 38 minutes--by far a personal best pace for me! And Ava did a 1/2 mile kids' fun run with her friend Madalyn. She really did have fun (and ran all but about 30 yards of it) and immediately started talking about doing it again next year!

We enjoyed a waffle breakfast and fire truck tours at the fire station.

The kids (well, mostly Ava) had a blast jumping with their friends at the Family Fun Fair.

The grande finale of Pan-O-Prog (for us anyway) is the Grande Parade. We sat in our spots along the parade route in downtown Lakeville and stayed for the entire two-and-a-half hours! There are marching bands from all of the state, clown, Shriners doing tricks, and lots of fun to watch! Our absolute favorite part was watching the kids in awe of what passed by and dance to all the music. We caught Ava's moves in this video!!!



After all that excitement died down, Mike and I took some time for a date night. We had a very nice dinner at Stella's and enjoyed a gorgeous night at the Twins game.