Celebrate Freedom!

Rewind to the 4th: After Brady's nap we went to the Bentonville Splash Park. The boys love that place. There are tons of fountains to run through and this time we brought buckets. It kept them busy for a long time and it let them get a lot of energy out despite it being so hot outside. 

 Then we headed over to Famous Dave's for some all-American barbeque. If you go before 5:30pm you can still get the lunch specials! It worked out great for us. The place was empty and the boys were really well behaved after an afternoon out in the sun. :)

 When we finished eating, we headed straight to Lake Atalanta for Ryan and Zach to get some fishing in and to wait for it to get dark enough to go see fireworks. Brady and I hung out by the shore with buckets and his little fishing pole.

 The lake is my favorite place to take pictures. My phone takes much better pictures outside and the lake is so pretty so you always have awesome backgrounds.

 Ryan would wander down to us between casts. We were always happy to have him visit. I think Zach liked the solo fishing time every now and then too!

 Believe it or not, we actually caught a couple little minnows in those buckets! They were the only catches of the fishing trip. Ha.

 We went home and got the kids bathed and in their pajamas and then headed out to find a good spot to watch the fireworks show. We really loved having Pops' truck to hang out in and wait for the show to start.

 The boys got to play with glow sticks again and they were a hit! Brady even wore one on his binky. It was too dark to get a good picture. And in case you're wondering, no. I didn't wear make up on the fourth, which I regret now that I see all the pictures we took. Haha. We didn't get home from fireworks until about 10:30pm. Both boys when straight to bed when we got home and slept until 8:45am the next morning! It was awesome.

 On Thursday night I made a cobb salad for dinner. We have been watching Master Chef this summer on TV and I was impressed with my presentation so I took a pictures. It tasted as good as it looks!

 Bentonville does a little celebration called First Friday on the first Friday of every month (clever name, huh?) We attempted to go yesterday, but Ryan was zonked out before we got there so we decided to just drive around and try to hit it in August. His head kept flopping around. At one point Brady was distressed and just kept saying, "NO! No! no!" I looked back and Ryan's head was totally flopped into his chest. Zach was kind enough to offer his belt. Problem solved.

 Saturday morning was a pancake breakfast and bike parade at church in honor of the Fourth of July. It was hot and humid and did I mention hot? The kids enjoyed it though. Brady thought he was pretty awesome in those sunglasses.

 We spent a lot of the time across the parking lot in the shade because Brady was obsessed with taking any unclaimed bike on the other side and, well, it was in the shade. Here he is trying to snatch my phone.

 Ryan decorated his bike. He had a blast doing laps around the parking lot. I will have to remember what a great bike riding spot the church parking lot is!

 One of our friends let Brady borrow their bike after seeing how obsessed he was. He loved it and we had to peal him off kicking and screaming when it was time to go.

We are officially on the down hill side of the summer. Only 5 more weeks! My mom comes into town on Tuesday and stays until the next Wednesday! I am so excited for her to get here and to show her around. It will be such a fun week with her here and by the time she leaves we will have less than a month before we head back to Utah! Bring it on!