Yankee Doodles

Anna and Alexander celebrated their first American Independence Day by barbecuing on the back porch, helping mommy make ice cream and dancing to tunes from Daddy's iPod. We'd wanted -- OK, well, I had really wanted -- to go see the Fourth of July fireworks spectacular at Mount Rushmore (which was actually on Tuesday night) but we discovered too late that the parking lot there gets filled up by mid morning and you otherwise have to park in the nearest little resort town 3 miles away and hike an 800-foot elevation. Since we only live about 20 minutes away, I thought maybe we could see them from our home. I even got up on the lowest elevated part of our roof to catch a glimpse but couldn't see a thing. On the positive side, it's kind of like being in downtown Chicago and looking up to find the world's tallest building. You can't see it because all the other tall buildings are blocking your view. I've already told Mikel that next year he should try to take off the entire day and we'll camp out with the kids at Mount Rushmore.