Fourth of July and Balloon Festival

We love the Fourth of July! It is so nice to have a little break in the summer where we can just stay in Provo and spend time together and remember how blessed we are to live in this wonderful country.

Independence Day was pretty low key for us. We started out by going to get a spot to watch the parade on Friday morning. While we were waiting for the parade to start, we saw the hot air balloons from the balloon festival take off. It was really neat to watch them. We also saw the runners for the Freedom 5k. We saw lots of crazy costumes. And finally, we got to the pre-parade (where we got lots of free stuff and good coupons) and the real parade. Just like last year, we were in front of an insurance place that gave out free pancakes and hot dogs.

This guy dressed as Uncle Sam ran the race on stilts!

Noelle Pikus Pace and her family were the grand marshals of the parade. We also saw them at the balloon festival on Saturday morning. 

After a quick lunch, we went to Orem to go to the colonial village. They had lots of demonstrations (way more than we were expecting!) that were very interesting to watch. There was an activity called "Roots of Freedom" where you could go on a little simulation about going through Ellis Island and becoming a citizen.  We didn't do the whole thing but plan on doing it next year. One of my favorite things that we did was go to a little musical program called "Cries of Freedom." It was really cute and took you through the history gaining freedom.

After our hot afternoon at the colonial village, we came home and watched National Treasure, made muddy buddies and got ready to go see fireworks. Like last year, we went in front of Helaman Halls at BYU to watch the Stadium of Fireworks.

Waiting for fireworks

The next day, we went to the Balloon Festival. It was so cool! Probably my favorite thing of the weekend. We got to walk around and see the balloons being inflated and taking off. The pictures speak for themselves.