Fabulous Fourth........

What a great day. Shawn wasn't on call so we got to see him all day long! Fabulous. The kids played outside and downstairs with dad in the morning so I was able to clean up all the things I've been putting off until I had back-up. Fabulous again. Jack took a nap on the couch so he could enjoy the fireworks without driving us all insane. Super fabulous. Then the real fun started. The 'Ville started doing a parade on the 4th a few years ago. It's a small parade, but totally worth it. When I say small, I mean it lasted a whopping 15 minutes. I actually really love this parade because you can show up 10 minutes before start time and get amazing seats. By amazing I mean in the shade only 20 feet from where you actually parked your vehicle. Who can beat that? The kids came prepared with walmart sacks to gather candy. You'd think with such a short parade you wouldn't need an entire bag to hold the loot, but we still have candy tucked away in the garage from last years homecoming parade. Best parade ever. Short and sweet, just how parent's like them.

Is this candy going to ever start being thrown at me?

The Candy Scramble.

Happy for the popsicle, irritated at the photography.

Hot little firecracker.

Landon loves those motorcycles.

Jack savors his sweet parade finds.











Landon sports his new prize from the home depot float.

After the parade we headed home to the neighborhood block party. That's right, I said BLOCK PARTY. I feel like a real-life-true-blue adult. I'm old enough to host a block party with my neighbors. Crazy. I'm not really old enough, am I? We started off with a little parade of our own. All the kids decorated their bikes and scooters and rode to the end of the street and back. Most were sporting swimsuits due to the extreme weather. High 80's with 97% humidity. It felt like a sauna.

After the parade, bring on the food! Everyone brought goods to share and boy were they good! We ate until we could eat no more, and until the men could no longer hold off lighting their explosive entertainment.

I'm happy to say that I know my husband as well as I thought I did, and when he came home from the fireworks stand yesterday, he didn't disappoint. Fabulous. Looks like explosives win out over knowledge of danger. So much for that medical degree. He even went over budget as I anticipated. He is seen here in this picture using one of his "launchers". I guess it is a necessary part of this holiday to use some type of launching mechanism in order to get the full effect. Unsurprisingly fabulous.I was proud of Shawn when he handed over the "punk" to Ethan and let him have a go at lighting the display. Ethan really got into it and I don't think the punk was ever returned to the rightful owner.

Jack was a little apprehensive, and Landon pretty much stayed on my lap. I was literally stuck in this chair all evening. (I don't use the word "stuck" lightly. The humidity made everyone sticky. )

Overall I'd have to rate this fourth as one of my favorite. I guess it's the first in a long time that I was actually able to enjoy the fireworks outside instead of viewing them through the living room window due to an inconsolable child. Fabulous. Ethan is already planning on what to buy next year. After all the kids were in bed (10:30 pm) and I was washing the sticky sweat off of my face, Shawn said to me, "good thing no accidents happened this year." My guess is that by the time the 4th rolls around next year the medical degree will kick in once again---that is until he enters that first firework tent and remembers what all the hype is about. Fabulous.