4th of July

We had a great 4th of July this year. It started out with the pancake breakfast at church - it's become kind of a tradition in this ward. I actually remember it being one of the first activities we came to when we moved here. That was a lot of fun - the boys enjoyed eating copious amounts of pancakes, and it was fun to sing patriotic songs.

In the evening we had plans to go downtown to see the fire works. Our bank (USAA) was sponsoring the big fireworks downtown, and I had reserved spots for us down on the B-Street pier. We weren't sure too much on the details of the event, so we packed some snacks and headed down. Luckily we had free parking right on the pier, so we didn't have to walk far. When we arrived we were very excited to see that there was a complete BBQ dinner being served, with all you can eat soda (a big hit with Harrison) burgers, hot dogs, chips, cookies, ice cream and all the fixings you could imagine. They had a little photo op where they took your picture, printed it, and gave it to you (for free!) and a bounce house for the kids to play in. Harrison and Noah loved playing in the bounce house, and watching boats sail and zoom by. They gave away several iPod shuffles (which we were not fortunate enough to win :(), little battery operated fans, and as many glow sticks as you desired. Harrison showed us some dance moves as we waited for the fireworks to start. Check out the movie... and the night ended with a fireworks show (of course.) The fireworks were launch from just a couple hundred yards away in the water, so it was pretty loud, but it was fun to watch. At the end of the day we were all pretty exhasted, but we felt it was worth it. And it was fun to see fireworks on the 4th again - it had been 4 years for us....