My Dreams Came True

After months of planning and dreaming, my Fourth of July dreams came true.  We got up early, packed our goodies and picnic basket, dressed in our red,white and blue finery, loaded in the van and headed north for our adventures.  Our first stop was a picnic lunch in the woods.  We found a suitable stop and set up our explosion of patriotism. Our menu consisted of hoagies, berries, grapes from the backyard, pasta salad and of course flag cake for dessert.   We also had a random bag of Bugles that Q referred to as carrots.  He refused to eat anything other than "carrots" and blueberries.  Whatever.  The kids thoroughly enjoyed arranging the berries to create our tasty flag cake and the boys desperately wanted to eat lunch in the trees.  I squashed that dream though and told them they could climb after lunch.  Which they did... with their cake.

We so enjoyed the cool breeze and smell of nature whilst eating our tasty and color-coordinated picnic lunch.  Also, Miss B's purse full of her hard-earned cash enjoyed hanging from a tree.  It stayed hanging on that tree until we were finished, loaded and headed a few miles down the road, when she thankfully remembered it.

We tried out some red, white and blue layered punch...which was quite the fun little Science project.  Apparently, the more sugary drink sinks to the bottom.  We found that we had to add the red Hawaiian Punch first with the (star-shaped) ice and then pour the blue Gatorade in slowly, allowing most of it to hit the ice instead of mixing with the red.  There were a few purple drinks from our mishaps, but we still had plenty of successful attempts.

Picnic in the pines... Check.

Que small town parade with candy and quaintness.  

(Also, me looking a bit frazzled and spacey in photos was not part of the master plan, but you get what you get and you try not to throw a fit.)

Q was enthralled.  He loved the drums and the candy and the cool cars.  It was such fun to watch him.

Finally... watch fireworks.  Next year's dream includes learning how to take great pictures of fireworks.  I only got one semi-decent one.  It's quite a challenge to hand hold a camera with a wiggly three-year old on your lap.  Note to self: bring a tripod next year if I'm really serious.

Oh and we mustn't forget the sparklers a couple of nights later.  The kids had a blast "drawing" shapes for me to take pictures of.  In hindsight, I realize it probably wasn't very smart to have the boys participate in sparkler fun with no shirts.  Luckily everyone made it out unscathed.  You see, we had spaghetti for dinner, and it's just easier that way.

Dennis was just starting another design (a tight spiral), when Miss B walked behind him with her sparkler, resulting in a fun effect.

And to sum up, I hope everyone's holiday was delightful, full of memories, patriotic and of course fun.  Also, may all your dreams come true!