4th of July

This has been just the weekend I've needed: lots of family time doing fun things, lots of time off with my Christopher, getting to sleep in and one night I even went to bed at 8:30, seeing extended fam.  It was just plain great!

Friday was an awesome family day.  Chris and I took Nobo to Lagoon and played and played.  We had a fun picnic lunch there and went until Noah just about dropped.  Then we headed home, Noah got a nap, and we got a relaxing break.  After he woke up we took ourselves to Famous Dave's for dinner, had a bunch of yumminess there, and went home to relax for a few hours and then do a few fireworks in our driveway.  It sounds like we did a lot, but really it felt like a whole lot of relaxed nothing all day long which was perfect.

Saturday, the fourth, after sleeping in again (sigh) I made our family's favorite banana bread and we took it and orange juice to the Layton City parade.  We met Linda, Dave, and fam there and had a great time.  Noah's favorite parts were eating as much taffy as he could get away with with his cousins and then seeing the horses.  Every time he sees a horse, he thinks it's my sister Megan's horse.  Pretty funny.  Later that night we had a bbq dinner with our friends in the neighborhood (the Bailey's) and then headed to Layton park to watch the fireworks with Laura's side of the family.

Grandpa & Grandma Buckholts really made the fireworks special for the kids.  They brought up all kinds of fun things to keep them entertained.  I loved, loved, loved watching my dad have fun with his grandkids.  My favorite part was that he went on a little shopping spree that afternoon and bought a bunch of things to play with with them.  My favorite was watching him have a silly string fight with them.  The glow sticks he bought were also a HUGE hit.  The girls turned them into princess crowns and fancy jewelry and the boys made Jedi costumes and light sabers with them.  It was great!  Baby Emily loved the fireworks and kept blowing raspberries at them, but wasn't too happy about the cannons going off.  Gwen took a few minutes to warm up to the fireworks, but eventually declared that she like them.  Noah laughed hysterically at the first couple of dozen that went off like he thought someone was making a huge joke by blowing things up in the air.  Big hit there!  I got to snuggle with him and my honey for the whole show and was a very happy mommy.  I love that I'm so surrounded by people I care about and by people who care about me.  I love being close to my nieces and nephews.  At one point I had Noah on one leg, Kimmie snuggled onto the other half of my lap, Chris by my side so I could rest my head on his shoulder, and Mason snuggled up to my other side.  That is the definition of a happy life.  It was a great holiday!