Happy 4th of July!

I think I may need to retitle my blog "Better Late Than Never"...because that is apparently how I roll these days.  Oh well!  I don't even know if anyone still reads it (ha!), but I love having a place to write and document our lives!

So here we go with our fun 4th of July!  It was really celebrated over the course of a few days - fireworks with neighbors on the 3rd, pool and grilling on the 4th, and rescheduled fireworks on the 5th!

On the evening of the 3rd, the big kids played with the neighbors while it got dark enough for fireworks.  Ryan went down to sleep at his normal time.  Then, once it was dark, we did fireworks with all the neighbors.  It was so fun!  And the dads had fun blowing stuff up!

On the morning of the 4th, we went to the pool in our neighborhood!  It was so fun to hang out together - and we also saw lots of friends while we were there!  It was a beautiful morning!

A little glimpse at some of my patriotic décor!  I still have it up so we can root for the USA in the upcoming Olympics!

We had some friends over to grill out and let the kids play - here is the spread of food and all the red, white, and blue desserts!  YUM!

We did kick the kids out of the house, which worked well considering the bright red icing on those little brownies!  Glad they ate those in the playhouse of the swingset!

After we ate, the kids suited up and played in the little pool next door!  They all had a blast!

They also enjoyed squirting some neighbors that kept driving by on a 4 wheeler - they were ready with water guns and buckets and a fireman hose!

And since they were all in the water, we decided to get a little redneck and have a group "bath" in the pool.  I call that efficient.  And better than no bath at all (which was the original plan)!  So here is Jack getting his hair rinsed.  And me scrubbing Stella's head!  They all thought it was the funniest thing - and we had clean looking kids!  I call that a win.

Then we loeaded up to head to our spot to let the kids play and watch fireworks.  It ended up being a bust because of this thunderstorm that moved in.  Boo. 

So we headed home and watched fireworks on TV and ate another treat.  The kids were pretty disappointed in no fireworks, but a cookie and still staying up late quickly fixed that problem.  We also got a family shot - love this!

And up close of the kiddos in their gear!

And we settled in for the Boston fireworks on TV!  It was quite the show!

The next day, we stuck with the patriotic theme since we were supposed to watch fireworks that evening!

We went in enough time for the kids to enjoy running and playing.  And they certainly took advantage!

Love this picture of Brad and Jack!  The back row of the seats in the van can become tailgate seats - Katie was excited to flip them back again this year!

Some other friends met us - but Ryan would have none of the picture time.  So we got a pic of our two big kids with Olivia!

And I ran into a friend there - weird to see each other out of working out context!  Except for the fact that I hadn't had a chance to take a shower yet, so I saw her at kickboxing class and then still had the same stuff on for fireworks.  Oops!

The kids were ready to watch some fireworks!  Love this.

Daddy and his boys.  We could definitely tell the trees had grown in 2 years - we couldn't see as well as we could two years ago!  Better than getting stuck in traffic...and awesome to let the kids run and play!

One more shot - Brad and the boys.  All the kids loved watching the fireworks!

And Brad and I got a picture together - I love it!

We had such a fun time celebrating the 4th!  It was full of friends and pool time and cheeseburgers.  Perfection!