Memorial Day

So today was Memorial Day.

This morning, Evan really wanted to go to the Gold Star Museum on Camp Dodge in Des Moines. I had to get up six hours ahead of schedule so we could get there in time.

They provided a "healthy breakfast" but i guess if you are a type two diabetic, that "healthy" part does not apply. (for those who don't know, my dad is a type 2 diabetic, and all he had out of that breakfast, he had  granola bar. Not cool!)

After we ate breakfast, we went to the museum part of it. 

This is what Evan was looking forward to. He was so excited that he wore my Grandpa's uniform, and was actually called what his coat said.

This is Evan standing with some re-enactors from the same war.

Hey look a floating helicopter!!

This is Evan looking through the telescope

If you have never been to the Gold Star Museum, it is a museum about all the wars starting with the Civil War and ending with the current war. It was pretty interesting to see all the different props and vehicles.   Also one of the main attractions, is a telescope, like the one on a submarine. ( Just to let you know, my eyes and telescopes/ binoculars do not agree at all. Like i can't see through them them. Does anyone else have this problem?) So, i kind of stood in line for about 5 min. for about nothing. :( But at least Evan enjoyed it.

This is me pretending to look through the telescope

This is a civil war re-enactor explaining to Kara and I about her layers of dress

After we got done touring the museum we went home and i went back to bed, and slept for a couple hours more.

Around 12:00, we got ready for our picnic with my cousins. After i woke up, for the second time, i saw how hard the wind was blowing, and thought about how much harder the wind was going to be at Big Creek; the place where our picnic was going to be at.

When i went out to the kitchen, where everyone was getting ready, no one seemed to care about the wind.

When we left and got to the beach, we were lucky enough to get a actual picnic table because some people were just camping out on the grass.( not like that would be a bad thing.)
It was so windy, that everyone (including my cousins) ditched the paper plates and ate in rounds. First- our sandwiches, second-watermelon in a cup, third- baked beans in a cup.
After we ate, all the kids made a bee-line towards the beach.
In our minds we had decided that we were going to make more than a normal old sandcastle and that we were going to make a string of islands with moats, lakes, streams, and dams in between. And it worked!
Here are some pics of our creation

This is Kristen (my cousin) Kara and i starting out.

We were about 2/3 of the way through with the whole process when this was taken

This is us drawing out what we were going to do (yes, these pics are out of order)

This shows how windy it was, i think you call them white caps

This was all of us who contributed to the making (some more than others)

(left to right- me, Kara, Kristen, Ryan (my other cousin, and Evan)