We came back to a full garden that is doing well, especially the weeds.
My grandma's allium flowers.
Orange poppies a co-worker gave me.
Daisys from a neighbor.
And my little assitant. Sporting his new hair cut. It was getting pretty long and the Monday after vacation Lori took him to swimming class and then to the barber.
The next Sunday I spent the day opening the pool. Baylor had thrown rocks onto the pool cover a few weeks ago and even tore a hole in the cover. Thankfully there was not hole in the pool or my reaction would have been a lot worse. But I had to drain off the water on the cover, get in and throw the rocks out and try to get the cover off without dumping all the maple tree seeds into the pool.
I did well with the first two things and managed to scoop out a lot of the tree crap but when I pulled off the cover, all the dirt and crap fell right into the pool. Great! We filled up the pool and turned on the filter. It ran for about four days and did a fairly good job of cleaning up. But we needed to get in to stir up the water more. Thankfully the beginning of June was very hot and the water was quite nice. Baylor was super excited to get in because he was doing so well in his swimming classes.
We went to Mom's over Memorial Day weekend for a visit and Ute taught me how to make spatzle properly. Baylor also watched in case I forgot anything.
Monday we went to Heather's and ending up joining in the parade instead of just watching it as we were planning. I don't think anyone noticed two extra people in the crowd. All the kids from the elementary school were in the parade but they were wearing their white school shirts. Baylor stood out a bit in his purple jersey.
The parade started at the school so there were several groups all over the place.
Most of the kids had flowers with them. Heather forgot hers and we did not know about it but Connor's friend shared with our boys. Apparently it is a very old tradition that the children walk in the parade and then lay flowers in the cemetery.
Once the band started to warm up we started moving. We were at the tail end of the students and the band fell in line right behind us.
When we came around the corner, John stepped off the street to join us. He works third shift and was a asleep when we left but woke up to join us. He made it just in time!
Baylor loved being with the kids! I think the whole idea of being in a parade was a bit lost on him because he could never see too far in front of him but he loved waving his flag and keeping up with the boys.
And then we were ushered to the sidewalk to sit and watch the parade. Heather and her friend did not know what they were in for having me beside them. I get a little crazy at parades: like a whooping and hollering crazy.
This is the PA governor Tom Corbett.
Being in Gettysburg, there were a lot of re enactors.
This carriage is carrying Abe Lincoln. The actor is really from Illinoise and his last name is Getty. I think Heather said he is a local teacher when he is not Abe.
This dude was totally posing for me.
And Brigid was waving to the horses.
And clapping along with the bagpipes.
This man was the begining of a line of soldiers showing the history of soldiers in costume. He would have been an early American Revolutionary War era soldier.
Civil War
WW I
WW II
And I don't know why I stopped taking photos because they had Korean War (they looked like they were on MASH), Vietnam, and one or two more.
The Zembo group.
And their go carts.
And of course a fire truck.
And then we had to get up and finish the parade.
That ended in the cemetery.
They have a whole ceremony with speeches and music (Taps) but either the Governor or Lincoln were stuck in traffic so it was just standing around waiting. The pergola stands were Lincoln, the real one, gave the Gettysburg Address.
We ended up walking back to Heather's because it was closer than walking back to her car. I have photos on my phone of us petting the Zembo horses but I don't know how to get them online yet. When we left we dropped Heather off at the car while John was with the kids. I loved watching the parade and being in it was pretty cool too!
On any random night Baylor may want to play pirates in the sink. This is what I found after he was done. I was pretty impressed that he nearly cleaned up.
Meme and Pap brought Eddy home the last week of May. She was on vacation there since the week before we went to Rickett's Glen. She does love them, especially Pap, but she comes home like any spoiled grandchild expecting to be feed four times a day and share whatever we are eating. But we did miss her and were glad to have her home. Other than the retraining to our ways. On Wednesday evening we went to meet the newest Grandson Adam Bradley. He was born late in April but we were never able to go visit because someone in our house was sick. But it worked out because Meme was really excited to go when they came down.
And so was Baylor. Dave and Laura were blessed with a little cutie.
Friday was Baylor's last swimming lesson. Since I had to take him I picked out his cute little swimming trunks (not board short style, more like boxer briefs) and the swimming teachers loved them.
He made a lot of progress this session. The first week he would not put his face in the water and on Wednesday the second week he conquered that fear with some encouragement from Tyson. He is a little fish already and can swim under water and tread water already. I love that Baylor is always smiling when he is in class, which often leads to drinking the water and choking, but he appears to love class.
He needs to take level one again and we will be signing him up this week for the next one. We went swimming several times in our pool and he was very good at jumping off the ladder and going under. He still likes the safety of his swimming vest which is fine by me.
Saturday I did some work at Molly's house. Her Nigella were in bloom, one of the beautiful blues in the flower world.
