Fourth of July

 We went on vacation for the fourth of July to Lake of the Ozarks and we went with our "framily" that we always travel with. This vacation was one the guys picked. We flew into Springfield and visited the largest Bass Pro Shop and had lunch. This was a very interesting store for me and it was PACKED full of people. After that we drove an hour and a half to our "luxury" suite at The Lodge of Four Seasons. Now, don't mistake this resort with The Four Seasons because it is not, it is "OF" Four Seasons...and it was definitely not luxury. 

Our view from the luxury suite.

The first night we went out for BBQ and it was probably the best BBQ I have ever had. I am not a huge BBQ person, but this place was fantastic. This is how we started the week so I was excited to eat out the rest of the week...only to be let down by other restaurants that led us right back to the Barn B-Que.

We rented a tri-toon boat for three days and spent three full days on the lake. It was a lot of fun. The kids tubed most of the time and we did park the boat a few times and just swam and had lunch. We also got a lily pad with the tri-toon so that was fun for the kids to play on. I did not tube only because I threw my back out right before we left for vacation. It was the first time I had ever done that. I bent over in the show and couldn't get upright again. It was the first time I ever felt like I am getting old. It caused my back to be out for about a week and it still isn't fully back to normal.

The dads and kids fished one day and Andy is the only one who caught a fish. He caught a catfish and Max was responsible for taking the below photo since I was in the water. 

The long days on the water made for really tired kids. Max even took naps on the boat.

Fourth of July was a lot of fun as we watched fireworks from the rooftop of the hotel. They launched fireworks from a barge right on the water and it was really cool to see. It was super hot out that night and you can see the haze in the pictures from that night. 

The last day we spent it in the pool. It was a relaxing day before we headed back to Arizona and back to work. 

It was extremely hot in the Ozarks as it was between 95 and 100 degrees each day with 85-90% humidity. Just miserable in terms of weather. We all agreed that we would take 110 degrees in AZ dry heat any day over that high heat with high humidity.