My family had a fun two day event for this holiday. The party started the night of the 3rd. We had an impromptu party at my parents house with all the kids. Matt stayed home with the Twins, because he was trying to finish some projects up so he could play with us the next day. My brother brought food. We had a backyard swim party, watched a movie, and topped it off with fireworks in my parents front yard. It was really fun. I headed home with my kids around 11:00 that night.
The killer of the whole thing was that I had to get up the next morning with Sammie and Eston to go participate in the Centerville City 5K. This was a fun 5K because we ran/walked it with Lindsay and Carly (my sisters), Dallin and Cathy and their kids (brothers family).
I'm glad that Lindsay took this picture. We were waiting to start the race, but were also waiting for Carly to show up. The gun goes off and we look behind to see Carly walking towards us wearing her flip flops. We slowly walked so she could switch shoes and catch up. The result of us doing this was, being the last people in line to start the race. It's kinda sad when you end up with a police escort behind you. We didn't finish that way, but we were close.
After the race we went and had a pancake breakfast in the park. After which we went to the parade. I do have to say that the parade is so much more enjoyable when you are not pregnant with twins. I didn't realize how miserable I was last year until I got there this year and was not restricted in movement and mass.
All the kids wore matching shirts for the day. The girls even had matching skirts. They looked pretty darn cute. However, we didn't get a great picture taken of them all. No one wanted to sit still.
Carly started laughing at Matt when he told her, "Some people fly flags, I fly babies."
For two boys with lots of energy it was pretty cute to watch them stand still with their hand over their hearts while our Flag was being carried in front of them.
The kids had a lot of fun gathering candy and playing with each other. Grandpa Jim (my dad) happened to be in the parade this year. He was on the emergency preparedness float for the city. When the float approached where we were sitting, it stopped. My dad jumped off and came and asked Sammie and Jake if they wanted to ride with him. They screamed yes and ran along with Dallin to get on board. Eston was sad about this but he will get a chance some day.
Apparently Sammie just wanted her mom the whole time she was up there.
After the parade we all headed home and took naps. Later that day we headed out to the annual Pedersen 4th of July celebration. It is one of the two times we see my cousins on that side during the year. We go to my Uncle Bob and Aunt Catherine's house to swim, eat, have a kids parade, and light fireworks. It is always a good time to see my cousins. Sammie and Eston just figured out how to swim with the help of floaties. They played for quite some time in the pool. Sammie even attempted jumping of the diving board. She never actually jumped, she just stood there and then walked off and to the side of the pool.
After which both kids got a hat and a flag to march in the kid parade. Sammie was in parade heaven.
When all was said and done we headed out to watch some fireworks that the City was putting on. Matt knows that the 4th of July isn't complete for me unless I have a parade and fireworks. In the past we have driven or walked over to Sugarhouse park, but this year we decided not to deal with the crowds. We saw a bunch of people congregating at the State Capitol and decided to try it out there. It was really nice. There weren't tons of people, you could see fireworks all over the valley, and it was relatively quiet. It was a nice change from the business of the rest of the day. The twins slept while we just relaxed. We got home and put the kids in their beds around 11:00 that night.
Even though we were really busy that day, we had a lot of fun family and celebrating our America's birthday.
