Fourth Of July Fun

We had a super holiday weekend of fun and family. We spent the 4th with dh's family. We arrived at sil's house for a lunch cookout where we also celebrated two July bdays: my ds2 turns 13 on the 14th and my niece turns 11 on the 10th. (Say that 5 times fast lol.) Since we don't get to see dh's family often, we decided to celebrate the bdays at this get together.

Ds and my niece blowing out the candles. I made the cake (click for the recipe.)

Since I have all boys, I don't get to shop for girly stuff except for my nieces...I love it lol! My only chances to go down the Barbie aisle at the store. Well, this niece is getting older and not playing with toys so much anymore. I decided to get her a purse and fill it with stuff. I found a cute little clutch with a matching wallet, and a heart necklace gift box that included 3 lip glosses. So cute! And she made my heart swell when she gushed that she had always wanted a purse like that. :)

After lunch we checked into our hotel room and had a little rest before heading to a lake to swim. We spent most of the afternoon in the water! Ds1 and his cousin, both 18, grabbed a rowboat and went fishing while the rest of us played and fed turtles. That's right, we fed turtles. Did you know they like Cheeetos?

Is she cute or what? Love the pose.

The birthday girl.

Ds3 must have jumped off the pier 100 times. I kid you not. And every pic we took has him in almost exactly the same pose lol! His hands are at his head in his traditional jumping in the water pose...he uses fingers to plug both his nose and ears. It's so cute.

There he is again...different picture, same pose. :)

After the lake (we missed the parade we stayed so late!) we headed back to the hotel to change and then back to sil's house for dinner. She makes the best mac & cheese and potato salad ever! Their cat recently had 5 kittens, so we spent a lot of time cuddling furry little critters. They were too cute. (But I got to thinking, is their such a thing as an ugly kitten?? I think not.) Cute picture alert, look away now lol!

Aw, look at the ones sleeping. The little white one was biting on the sleeping gray one's ear.

We then walked down to the lake and watched fireworks. I missed out, as ds4 decided at the last minute that he wasn't interested in this ritual and wanted to leave. (In 3yo language this means pitched one loud fit lol.) By the time we walked back he was asleep. It was a wonderful day.

Saturday we spent hanging out at the house, sheltered from the storms. That's okay, the plants needed the rain. Today dh took the older boys to fly toy airplanes and helicopters with my brother. They had great fun with that. It felt strange having only one child in the house...we indulged ourselves and made a quick trip to the gas station store for little debbie doughnuts and a newspaper...and ate them all ourselves lol. Right now we are all engrossed in the Harry Potter marathon on t.v. Hope everyone had a safe and fun holiday!