Our 4th

Here are some pictures of our day on the 4th. It started out with Aaron going fishing with Uncle Russell, Aunt Dana, and their friend Chad. I took Sadie out there so that she could see the water dogs that they had brought for bait. Sadie, even though she can be quite a girly-girl, went country on me and didn't hesitate to pick up those water dogs. She also grabbed minnows that were also brought for bait. Here she is with one of the water dogs she played with...



Here's a picture of Aaron casting. He loves going fishing. Thanks for taking him, Uncle Russell :)

Next was Caden's birthday party. Here are some pictures of the water balloon fight...

Aaron and Caden ganging up on Cody (there's power in numbers)

Sadie getting ready to attach Aaron...

It was amazing how quickly those kids went through a ton of water balloons. When they ran out, they decided to take matters into their own hands and fill their own balloons. Unfortunately, they couldn't tie their own. Here are the boys waiting patiently for their turn to fill a balloon.

They also had tons of fun on Aunt Sandie's water slide. Thanks for always having such fun stuff for the kids to do :)

They also did a pinata and cupcakes at the party. They had a blast! What a great party! Then it was on to the next festivities...the fireworks at the farm! Here's a picture Toby took of me and Sadie lighting a hen. Like on of my cousins said after doing one with her kids, "Are those things really worth 75 cents?"

We didn't really get any good pictures of Aaron doing fireworks this year. Part of that was because he was much more independent this time and would run off and do his fireworks on his own.

Then, this arrived:

We got a ton of ran, and everyone ran inside and ate. Well, everyone except dad, who stayed out to man the grill. Thanks dad! You're the man!

While waiting on the rain to stop, I played my first ever game of 42. For anyone reading this who is not a part of the family, you need to know that 42 is a HUGE family tradition. Every time we get together, the parents would always play 42. Over the years, a few of my cousins have started playing too. So last night, me and one of my other cousins who has never played get a tutorial. For the most part, it was like learning a new language, and often, we had no clue what our mentors were talking about. But in the end (even though I lost), it was a great experience. However, I would not be able to play by myself yet...I think I would need about 20 more tutored games to start figuring things out...Thanks to Aunt Cindy for sharing her 42 knowledge with me, and for putting up with my lousing hands :)

Then, the rain left just in time to do the real fireworks...the ones for the dark. It was great. I missed a lot of them because of the 42 game, but still got to see plenty. I hope everyone else had as great of a 4th as we did :)