Monday, July 17, 2017

4th of July 2017

The 4th of July is always one of my favorite holidays.  I just love how laid back and fun it is.  For my family, it's all about having a good day and spending time together - which is a nice change from holidays that are all about gifts or going all out.  This year, we had a pretty laid back 4th.  After celebrating three times last year, we needed something a little more low-key!

Our local movie theater does $1 kids movies on Tuesdays and Thursdays in the summer.  They were showing The Secret Life of Pets (one of my kids' favorites) on the 4th, so we decided to fill our morning at the movies.  Thankfully, it was completely dead and we didn't have a huge crowd!

After the movies, we went to Gigi's house to spend the rest of the day there.

We've come a long way from matching 4th of July shirts from Old Navy and watching the fireworks in Martin Stadium.  :)

I just want to pause for a minute and say how much I am loving the kids' ages right now.  8 and 5 is just a magical place to be!  I am really loving this stage that we're in right now!

I'm so happy that Laura and Ben were in town this year!  They usually are every year, but it makes me happy just the same.

This is Cooper's "big smile" face - haha.  I love it!


My two patriotic babies!

We ate lunch and then it was time for naps - we all needed energy for swimming, eating, and fireworks!

After nap time we hit the pool!


Two thumbs up for the 4th!


Kayla and Andrew came over to swim and celebrate with us!

Classic 4th of July food - burgers, hotdogs, chips, deviled eggs, cowboy caviar - all the summer goodness!



Group shot!  Pop was recovering from foot surgery, but Grammy came to swim and eat with us!


LL found a turtle!  This animal loving girl was as happy as can be.

I don't think Ben realized that the flag was backwards for us since it was correct for him.  ;)


Gigi and her girls and grands.

After dinner we did some "pre fireworks".  

These boys were ready!

First a turtle, now a baby gecko.  I'm telling you, this girl is an animal whisperer!

We are the only ones that wanted to participate in the sparklers - the boys were not interested.


Om and Opa were having a party with their friends, so we stopped by there for a few minutes before heading home.  Again, LL found an animal to love on.

We all reconvened at 8:00 for the real fireworks!

This was our "fireworks watching" crew.

These guys were in charge of putting on the show!

Laura brought lots of candy and fun patriotic glow sticks and accessories for everyone.




Koko came, too!


Gotta have that ear protection!  ;)  It wasn't that loud - the kids just wanted to wear Mr. Andrew's cool headphones!



We had several big fireworks to set off, but now that we have neighbors, we really had a show!  So many of our neighbors bought tons of fireworks, and we were kind of in the middle of it all.  We just sat outside until almost 10:00 watching all of the fireworks!

Here is a video of our 4th:

Here is a look back at all of our 4th celebrations starting from when I was pregnant with LL!


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