Our 4th of July!!

The parade!

 

We had a great 4th of July again this year! For the last three years we have been invited to the Erickson's annual 4th of July bash and it is so fun.  This year, the Erickson's left for the summer -- Phil is teaching  at BYU.  It seemed lonely and sad to celebrate the 4th without them so I suggested to Ryan that maybe we should host their party at our house this year since it was our last 4th in Iowa.  He agreed that we should.  So we did!

 

 

Our 4th of July went down like this:  First thing at 10:00 AM was the city's parade.  I did not go.  I wanted too, but I wasn't up to it.  Last year I went and got sick in the sun, so I stayed home.  Ryan said the kids had a blast.  He took these pictures for me.   

 

 

 My cutie boy!

 

 

And my cutie girl...I was proud that she was wearing red, white, and blue, but she didn't have her hair combed yet! 

 

 

 

At 12:30 our party started.  I have to say we were ready when our guests arrived-a miracle!!  Look at these cute desserts that they made and brought!  It was blueberry buckle and jello cake--both were so good.

 

Here are some pictures of our guests.  Here you see Laura in yellow.  She made the cute jello cake. 

 

 

 

Here is the crowd, listening to Ryan welcome everyone, and telling them that we only have one rule, --no drowning!!

Still listening to Ryan!

 

Elder Bailey and the Blackmon's on the couch. 

 

Cute Perry's enjoying Ryan's fine grilling of hotdogs and hamburgers! 

 

 

We had two small tables for the kids...thanks Erickson's for lending us all your party gear!!  Here are a few Nelson's with  Jace and Sanders-wearing yellow.  I just have to say that Jace has been so excited for the last month helping us plan the festivities for the day!!

 

This is Jared and Issac Nelson.  They were the first family that befriended us when we moved here.  They invite us to Thanksgiving and Christmas at their house each year.  We will miss them!

 

 (Notice the blue tarp above Jared's head??  The Dr was very proud of this invention!  It made our deck so pleasant to sit out on and eat!-- and special thanks to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints for providing the table and chairs!!)

 

Elder Jentzen from Idaho! 

 

 Lunch!

 

 

After lunch Ryan took the cover off the pool, and the craziness began!!! 

 

Here is the backyard from my view on the upstairs deck.  I sat outside with all the women having a lovely visit while Ryan--in his own words--was preventing Lord of the Flies from happening in our backyard!!  Good job Dr.!!  We set out our slip n' slide as well, but the pool was the main attraction.   

 

 

Here are the kiddie pools for the small kids.  (Notice the yellow and red floating squeaky toys--those were great fun until our neighbor's lab got one through the fence and ate it...that added some drama to our party! Luckily the dog was fine--could have been a nice sized vet bill!)

 

 

 

 After the kids swam for a good hour or so, we had a piñata-courtesy of Jace's party planning!

 

Ryan was in charge of all the activities.  He is fun and funny...so it was perfect. Here the kids are voting to hit the piñata either blind folded or not blind folded. 

 

Jace and Gracie had gone with me to pick out the pinata and Jace had filled it with about 8 lbs of goods,  he was so excited to share it with his friends.  

 

We started with the youngest kids hitting it first then going up to the oldest.  Here is my little darling-with her hair combed-giving that treasure chest a few good whacks. 

 

 

 

 

This is my only picture of Jace ! 

 

 This is Nate Perry.  His parents Ben and Jessica are in the background in red shirts.  Ben is in the Elder's quorum presidency with Ryan and Jessica has been my home-school mentor this year.  We have grown pretty close.  We will miss them. 

This is Jared Perry.  Jace's idol!!  Jared loves Legos and Jace adores him! 

 The kids getting the goods after it fell down. 

 

 More distribution of the goods.  The parents were so helpful and made sure everyone got some loot. 

 

 

 In Erickson tradition, we had a watermelon toss.  We had two watermelons.  The first one, Jared Nelson tossed for us above the red plastic tablecloth you see, and the last one, Shayna Blackmon threw off our deck!

 

 

 

 

 

 

And there it is.... and the kids gulped it down.  I forgot to take a picture of us eating it.  It was good!! 

 

 

Laura had brought snakes and sparklers for the kids and Jared Nelson lit them for us.  The kids LOVED it!!!! 

This picture is of Gracie getting a sparkler..it made this post because it is the only picture of me.  You can see my white baby bump in the background--23 weeks!

Our guests had all left by 5:30.  It was so fun. They were wonderful. We had 30 people total including the 4 of us.  I was so touched that they all stayed and cleaned up everything for me.  They didn't want us to do it. We rested up and went to Coralville's fireworks that evening.  Notice Gracie-she is fast asleep under her pink blanket.  We tried to wake her up, but she was exhausted from a very full day. 

 

 

 Luckily, on July 5th Iowa City did their fireworks. Gracie was awake for these.  She was pretty crushed that she had missed them the night before.

 

 

 

Aren't their "ear muffins" great.  They hate the noise! 

 

 

Fireworks!!

 

 

It was a great day filled with blessings. As I was decorating for our party that morning, I was so grateful that our prayers had been answered.  We had been praying for a warm, sunny day, but our weather had been awful for weeks and was predicted to still be stormy and cold for the 4th so my heart was so full of gratitude when I woke up to a beautiful, warm, sunny day. We also felt so blessed to be surrounded by people that we have grown to know and love . 

 

We are so blessed to live in AMERICA!! 

God bless America, Land that I love!

 

 

 

An attempt

I have been wanting to post for the last 2 weeks, but I haven't had time.  This is my attempt to catch up a little bit. 

Friday-July 5th- we finished our 2 weeks of swimming lessons.  They were a huge let down this year.  The reason...it has been freezing cold here.  The western United States has been burning up with heat and we have been freezing.  When I say freezing I mean 64 degrees at 10:30 in the morning when it has been time to leave for class.  Of the 10 sessions we paid for we attended 5.  Gracie loved it.  I snapped these 2 pictures of her in the baby pool during her Tots at Play class before I got in trouble. No cameras allowed! Jace was off on the other side of the pool FREEZING to death.  His teacher often had him get out of the pool and come find me because his lips were blue and he was shaking. 

T-ball is still in full swing until either the 16th or 23rd of July.  Tonight we have a game but it is pouring rain today, so we might have to push everything back a week.  When it is Jace's turn to be in the outfield, he always just takes a comfy seat on the grass.  When he plays pitcher or catcher though, he has amazed Ryan and I with his ability to get the ball and throw it in to home base.  

 

Here is our athlete in outfield, in his own little world while the game is going on around him!! So funny!

 

 

 

Another project the Dr has been wanting to take on, but the cold weather hasn't allowed him to, is get our pool up and filled for the year.

  Earlier in June I made the mistake of telling the Dr that I didn't care if we put the pool up this year.  I told him it was too cold for me this year, that I didn't have a swimming suit I could fit in, and I just didn't have the energy to take it on.... bla, bla, bla.  The Dr informed me that he would be putting it up, and filling it up, and throwing me in if need be, that after he spent several weeks digging a hole last year to put it in... I would be swimming!! 

 The Dr rarely puts his foot down, I find it so funny- and cute- when he does.  Yes, he was really serious.  Especially since I just called our realtor a few weeks ago and she informed us that the best thing to do would be for the Dr to re-fill the hole this fall and either lay sod on it or reseed it to sell the house this spring.  He is so excited about this project...the top soil alone is only going to cost him about $175..........good thing he loves me.....lots. 

 

So on Saturday, June 29th, despite the fact that it was 72 degrees, the Dr took on the pool project because we were having a 4th of July swim party at our house.  Here you see Jace taking on the not so easy job of hauling the pool polls to the back yard.

 

 

But one by one they were able to get them transported via dump truck to the back yard. 

 

It was no easy feat says the Dr!!

 

 

Scrubbing the liner with Scotch Pads and Soft Scrub--got all the dark stains right off.

 

It took awhile.

 

 

Monday evening, July 1, brought them to the next step of scrubbing the pool steps that had sat on our back patio all winter long. 

 

 

But Gracie got them all shiny and white.

 

The poll assembly crew

That night Andy showed up to help Ryan put the thing together.  I wasn't able to help much this year.  I am not supposed to lift more then 20-25 lbs.

I had to head off to the gym and when I got home about 50 minutes later they had made great progress.  I especially enjoyed the sight of the vacuum in the back yard. I guess they had decided to vacuum the liner before they started to fill it.  We have a clean pool!

 

 

Starting to fill it. 

After an inch of water gets in it, the next step is to get out all the wrinkles.

 

Somehow the Dr was able to manage that with Robin and Rue RUNNING around dancing in the water.

 

 

Gracie slipped and got soaking wet, but it was no problem, we just put her swimming suit on.  The water was so cold.

We let it fill over night and the next morning when we inspected it, it had three leaks!!  Water was squirting out in 3 places.  We couldn't believe it!  But the Dr again came to the rescue and fixed them on his lunch hour.  He's the man.

Three days later was our 4th of July party. I will post pictures of that later this week.  It was a huge success, I was so happy...and so exhausted.