July 4th weekend

We did not have much planned at all for the weekend as of Thursday morning and then things started to fall into place. Anna wrapped up her week at Camp Invention on Friday. She had a great time and seemed to be in her element learning how things work, taking apart items and creating new items. She was excited to show off what she had done during the week on Friday afternoon.

anna with some friends at the camp invention open house

Saturday was haircuts for the girls and a spontaneous trip for Gary and I to Nashville to see U2 in concert. I was thrilled that we found tickets so easily for a decent price on Thursday night. Mom was keeping the girls already on Saturday night so it just added a few hours to their planned stay. Gary and I road tripped to Nashville for the concert that was in Vanderbilt Stadium...one of the smallest venues on their stadium tour which made it great for all in the house. There were many thousands of brave souls on the field during the concert and who I am sure arrived early for their general admission standing room only spots, but they had a great vantage point. It was hot and we decided we were not too thrilled about the opening act, Florence and the Machine, so we arrived about 8pm. U2 took the stage a little before 9pm and played until around 11:15. It was a very, very good concert. Bono and the rest of the group are very socially aware and spiritually aware, even leading the crowd in an acoustic version of Amazing Grace. The unplanned moment of the night was at the very end when the band had completed their encores and were ready to head out when a blind man on the front row held up a sign that he wanted to play a song with the band. Bono obliged, brought the man up on stage, sang along with his accompaniment and had the rest of the band join in. Aftewards, Bono gave the man his own personal guitar which I know he will treasure forever. Great times and glad we went.

crazy set up for the concert, but amazing during the show

awesome concert...picture before we got too sweaty!

Sunday night Anna and I ran in the Firecracker 5k...see separate post for the sweaty post-race report! Sleeping in, sprinkler park, cookout and fireworks summed up our actual 4th of July. It was nice to hang out with the girls, with nothing really on the agenda and then join Mom and Dan for the Germantown fireworks. It was much cooler on Monday night (84 degrees with low humidity!) and we had a great display of fireworks to watch. The girls fell asleep in the traffic on the ride home and slept in on Tuesday as I was off work.Great weekend...love how things fell into place so nicely without a lot of effort!

silly sisters at the sprinkler park

decked out for the 4th

enjoying the fireworks together

loved the fireworks!