Rylan's First 4th of July

Our family went to Seattle for the 4th of July to visit Bryon's parents. They sure showed Rylan a good time! He loved every minute of the trip and saw and experienced more in the four days we were there than he has in months! Rylan went to his first parade, saw fireworks for the first time, saw about 100 different breeds of dogs (Rylan says "da" for dog every time he sees one, so we got to hear him say this a lot on our trip), saw a train go by, saw baby ducks, squirrels, fish, a really big troll...and the list goes on.

On the morning of the 4th we went to the Edmonds parade. Rylan loved watching all the people and animals! His favorite part of the parade had to be the firetrucks. The sirens scared him at first, but once he was used to the loud noise, he really got a kick out of it.

Rylan was ecstatic that he was able to pet (more like grab) a bird. Luckily this bird was very tame and friendly and put up with a small amount of roughness from our little boy.







On the evening of the 4th, we went on a walk along the beach in Puget Sound. This was one of the many sculptures we saw along the way. Rylan was a little standoffish as he didn't know if these seals were alive or not. Later, we watched the fireworks show and he loved all the bright flashes of color.






We took a walk around Green Lake (3 miles). These ducks are just a few of the many animals we saw along the way. We even got lucky enough to see a Mama Duck with her babies. Rylan liked to hear them "quack".









We visited the troll that lives under the Aurora Bridge. Notice he is holding a real Volkswagen Bug in his hand. He looks mean and scary, but even after explaining to Rylan that he's actually really nice, he still wasn't sure that he wanted to get too close. Who can blame him?