God Bless America!!!

I love the 4th of July! Maybe it was growing up in New England where history seemed to come alive for me, but it has always been a special holiday.

For the first time in a couple of years, Rob wasn't working on the 3rd or 4th (the place he moonlights at usually does a big party thing that he works at). On Saturday, we took the morning pretty easy, then went over to Kora and Bret's house for dinner. Susie was working, but Travis joined us. The kids had fun playing together, as usual, and the adults had fun playing games like Rockband on their wii. I even managed to not stink on the bass guitar! Travis really got into it though and proved that the hours he had spent playing it with his roommates at college was worth it :) The kids interrupted our game and electrified us by announcing that they had found a scorpion in the yard. Bret and Rob ran out to check and discovered it was a crawdad instead of a scorpion :)

As it got later, all of us piled into our cars and drove to watch the fireworks. We always sit in the same place, which is about 1/2 mile from the park where they set them off. It's hard to see the lower ones, but we have a perfect view of the rest of them, there is lots of room for the kids to run and play, and we don't have to worry about traffic afterward. This year there were tons of june bugs and the kids had lots of fun chasing them (and each other). It had rained earlier that day, so there were only a few other people there. We spread blankets out and Bret brought chairs for Kora and I. The kids made a fort with an extra blanket, chased june bugs and played tag.

Sunday we went to church, then took turns napping in the afternoon. Travis and Susie came over for dinner. Travis brought bacon-wrapped steaks for the adults (the kids got some too) and we grilled hamburgers and hot dogs, along with corn on the cob. We also had potato salad and watermelon (although we forgot about the watermelon, so we're eating that today). For dessert, we made a cake we make every year. Megan made the cake this year (from a boxed mix), then once it was cool, we covered it with homemade whipped cream and the kids decorated it with raspberries and blueberries. Megan wanted to place the fruit in the shape of a flag, but the other kids decided they'd prefer a random pattern.





The finished product ~


And a silly picture ~


Travis and I had bought a tube of party poppers and stuff like that, so after dessert we all went out in the back yard and set them off. They are set off by pulling a string, which fires out strings of tissue paper or confetti. We also had a couple of boxes of little tissue wrapped thingies that made a loud bang when you threw them on the ground. Rob demonstrated by doing a sort of Latino style dance, punctuated with the pops. I got it on video :)