Celebrating the 4th of July!

This year our little family had such an enjoyable time celebrating the 4th! Mark was able to have Friday off. It was a wonderful treat to have him home. On Friday morning, Mark watched Karmindy, while Kaleb and I decorated his tricycle with some of our good friends for our Wards bicycle parade. Our ward has a 4th of July breakfast every year at our neighborhood park. After breakfast all the kids ride their decorated bikes around the park while all the parents line the side walks and cheer them on. It is a really cute idea! Kaleb loved decorating his tricycle with his friend Matt and begged me constantly to let him ride his bike all day after it was decorated!

Kaleb and his friend Matt showing off their decorated bikes!

Friday night Mark and I were able to get out and have date night and double with some friends! It was a lot of fun and was so nice to leave the kids with a little gal in our ward and get some couples time. For our double date, we went and tried a new pizza place called Sweet Home Chicago! It was delish. After dinner we went and saw the movie, 'The proposal." It was cute!

Miss Independence!

Our little "Miss Independent" has been walking non-stop for the past few days! She definitely tries to keep up with her big brother and can't be out done by him!

Kaleb on his way to the bike parade!

Kaleb getting so excited for the bike parade!

Karmindy didn't want to be left out and had to take her turn riding her big brothers cool 4th of July bike!

On Saturday, we got up early and went to our ward breakfast and watched Kaleb ride his decorated bike. In the afternoon we headed up to Daybreak with some friends. They have kayaks and we went kayaking and let our kids play in the sand by the lake. It was a really fun outing.

This is probably one of the few pictures that I have of Karmindy playing in the sand. Karmindy loved the water and had absolutely NO FEAR!! She kept crawling toward the water to play in it. She would have kept crawling into the deep areas if I would have let her! Karmindy is our little dare devil!

Our little water baby playing in the sand!


Mark and Kaleb getting ready to take off in the Kayak!

Me, Mark and Kaleb enjoying Kayaking!

In the evening we had a BBQ with the same good friends that we went kayaking with and then went and watched fireworks with the rest of our neighbors and friends. Our neighborhood has the tradition of getting together in someones front yard and pooling everyones fireworks together so everyone can enjoy them. Our neighborhood fireworks show lasted for two hours! It was also fun to watch other neighbors launch illegal fireworks neighbor hoods away! (A big no-no but so cool! :) ) We had front row seats to see everything!

Our 4th of July Holiday was a wonderful one and I am truly grateful to live in a country that is free! I wanted to personally thank my two brother in laws, Kevin and Caleb for serving our country at this time and protecting our freedoms. Happy 4th Everyone!