Independence Day

Backtracking just a little bit...we actually pulled off a pretty fun Fourth of July celebration this year. Despite the fact that Charlie had to work both Saturday and Sunday we still partied hard!!

I organized a block party on Saturday night for all my neighbors on the street. I was a little nervous that no one would show up but decided to forge ahead with it. My friend Terra, who lives next door, loved the idea and so I figured if anything our two families would be there and have fun together.

Luckily a lot of our other neighbors though it was a cool idea and we actually had a good showing! We got to meet a few of our neighbors that we had never met before and got to know some of the others even better.

If you ever want to throw a block party yourself...here's what I did (but obviously you can do whatever you want!) I made a flyer and passed them out to each neighbor the Monday before the event. I tried to personally invite each of them so they knew it was for real but those who weren't home I just left a flyer on their front porch. I originally wanted to do a full blown BBQ but quickly became overwhelmed by the cost and all the work that would entail. So then I decided to make it simple and do a pot luck dessert table. We started at 7:00 PM and met inside the garage of a neighbor (who has an immaculately clean and organized garage). I made a quick welcome announcement and then each person introduced themselves. We sat and chit-chat for a long while and ate yummy desserts. As it got darker we pulled out some of our fireworks and let the kids do snaps, sparklers, and lit some fountains in the middle of the cul-de-sac. Everyone pitched in to help clean up and we all had a great time! I think we'll do it again next year.

Sunday we threw a spontaneous party in our backyard. We entertained two of our friends (Heidi & Candice) with their children. We grilled up some hot dogs and had all the usual picnic fixings. Charlie was a good sport and lit all the fireworks for our entertainment.

Later that night our neighborhood turned into a full-blown war zone! EVERYONE was putting off the illegal fireworks. It was almost like each neighbor was competing with the next for the biggest and most fireworks. We decided to move to the front yard and watch the show right there in the neighborhood. However, one of our neighbor's firework went straight to the right instead of straight to the sky and headed right to us. We freaked out as the blast was happening right at our feet when to our surprise ANOTHER one came at us! We all ran for cover and headed inside for safety. Dallin was yelling, "We're gonna die!" the whole way into the house. It was so funny to see everyone scramble, but it was really scary at the same time. Needless to say, this incident did nothing to help my children get over their fear of fireworks.