Our Fourth of July Festivities - Lots of Pictures

Figured it was time for a good long picture post, and our fun day yesterday was the perfect excuse.

We headed over to Joy and Jim's house late morning to spend the day with them. First we went to the parade in Magna - Magna is a fairly small town with a cute little parade. The floats were simple, mostly cars with signs, but they all threw lots of candy and the parade wasn't overwhelmingly long. Lots of fun for everyone.

Here we are waiting for the parade to start - Zaylee sitting beside cousin Jaime, and Jeff and Thomas hanging out together.



Zaylee wasn't exactly an assertive candy-grabber, so Aunt Joy helped her. Zaylee was more interested in the eating part.



There were a couple more creative floats that I wanted to share. First was the local theater company, who were advertising their production of "Once Upon a Mattress." That got me excited because my school did that show when I was in the 8th grade. It was my first time being in a school play, and led to my lifelong love of the theater. This float brought back memories!


Then there was this amusing float advertising a business called Forever Roses. Click to enlarge so you can read it. I thought it was kinda funny.


The weather cooperated pretty well for the parade. It was mostly cloudy, with spurts of sunshine. Just as the parade began to wrap up, it started raining. I thought this scene was fun, this was a group of people sitting in front of me, all with their different colored umbrellas, watching the end of the parade.


After the parade, the rain let up almost immediately as we walked back to the cars, which was nice. Then it was nice and sunny/partly cloudy for the rest of the day. We spent the next several hours at Joy and Jim's house, just hanging out and having a good time.

We went outside for a while, where the kids had lots of fun. Zaylee and Marilee played with this little shopping cart and doll, while Thomas enjoyed scooting around on this bike thing that he absolutely loved! We'll have to get him something like that when we actually have room for it, because he was playing on it practically all day Friday and Saturday.



Jim hooked up the guitar and amp outside and was rocking out, hoping that Thomas would do his crazy funny dance again like last night. He didn't really dance the same, but he had a great time running around excitedly! I think he was just too excited about being outside. That, and this time it wasn't 10:00 at night... Anyway, this is the closest he got to dancing like last night. I still think it's cute because it shows his adorable running - I love how his arms flail when he runs!

Later, back inside, Joy broke out karaoke mike and hooked it up to their CD player. Zaylee had a great time singing along to Ozzy Osbourne, rocking an awesome hairdo (if it hasn't been made clear, this is a family that really enjoys their rock music).


In the evening, we went with Joy and Jim over to Joy's friend's parents house for a barbecue. Joy's friend Marlise invited us to come along last night when she and her girls came over, even though we'd pretty much only just met. Friendly folk! So we went and, despite not knowing anyone there, had a great time! We were welcomed as part of the family.

Thomas, having already had a long day, fell asleep on the way there and stayed conked out for quite a while.


He later woke up and found a great deal of enjoyment on the kiddie swing. Look at that face!


Zaylee found the bounce house immediately, and spent much of the evening there.


Marlise's mother brought over a box of corn husks for the kids to feed the horses, and Zaylee had a blast with that! Unfortunately, she was only wearing socks at the time, having just come from the no-shoes-allowed bounce house. All the weeds and stickers that stuck in her socks rendered them unwearable for the rest of the evening.


Dinner was absolutely delicious! They had grilled steak, grilled chicken, corn on the cob, lots of fruits and vegetables, chips, potato salad, rolls. Yum!



Unfortunately, I ate waaaaayyyy too much and ended up getting sick in the middle of the night, and feeling slightly ill and super sluggish all day today. But boy howdy, it was some delicious food!

Of course, a highlight of the evening was setting off fireworks. Some of the older kids took responsibility (with adult supervision) for lighting the fireworks. There were some really fun ones!



Thomas and Zaylee were enthralled - they didn't get even a little bit scared. During some of the bigger, louder ones, Thomas even got so excited he was clapping his hands and laughing. So cute!

So there you have it - our Fourth of July festivities. We had a great day!