Fourth of July

We have hosted Christopher's family for lunch at our cabin the last few years, and I was a bit worried about this year.  I decided to really decorate the place this year - we host for this holiday every year, so I can certainly purchase decorations and know I will use them again.  The first thing I set out that morning was wrapping streamers around the deck railings.

It started drizzling within seconds.  Thankfully it never went to actual rain, but it kept trying for a while.  And then I was sweeping the porch when the canopy we set up the night before blew over in a slight gust of wind.  I spent an hour crying and trying to duct tape it back together before giving up and calling it a $100 loss.

Thank heavens everything went smoothly after that.  I repurposed the paper stars I made for the canopy and draped them from the deck.

I showed Tyler and Kaitlyn how to make their hats so the cousins could see the idea when they got there.  I'm glad I had my little craft table - we have a lot of toddler cousins, and they all thought it was great to make their own festive hat.  And Tyler found a catapillar (which Kaitlyn refused to touch.)

And then everybody finally made it - we only had a couple of people get lost this time.

After lunch wound down, the brothers started to break out the dirt bikes and three-wheelers and head down to the track.  As I talked to my sister-in-law that just barely moved here from Ohio, I mentioned that the four-wheeler is "mine" because it is the only automatic one so that I can drive it.  And she just lit up when I told her she could drive it on the roads.  Pretty soon she gave her kids rides . . . and their oldest son even took his sister for a spin.

I loved how excited they were about it.  I mean, I love driving around on that thing with the kids!  The serious four-wheelers we get at our cabin are dissapointed because the serious trails are a few miles away, and all we have in our neighborhood are gravel roads the cars drive on.  But I loved that they thought that was a fun time as much as I do!

One of the other big hits for the day was this water balloon maker.  You can fill the container with water, fit a balloon on the spout, and then just pull the trigger to fill the balloon.  The fabulous part was that the kids could all do this themselves, and the only adult help needed was to tie them off for the littlest ones.  All of the moms were really happy that the kids could have a grand time with no help needed.  The older ones had fun chasing each other around, and the littlest ones just carried them around like they were precious treasures.

Also on the craft table were some foam glasses to decorate.  And my favorite moment of the day was later on, when Tyler noticed other kids making them, and did this all by himself.  He picked out the glasses, peeled the backing off the stickers, and put them on as I got over there.  "Mommy, I made glasses!"

(I don't care if it is out of focus.  It is still my favorite picture from the entire day.)

Kaitlyn made some glasses too.  They just weren't quite as useful . . .

I hope you all had a great day as well!  I know we certainly had a wonderful day with family.