It's gonna take a few parties . . .

like this one to convince some of our tri-city friends who are less than enthusiastic about the 4th of July that it's really the BEST HOLIDAY EVER!  I think we made at least a little progress toward that end this year, though :)

Yummy Food

Elias REALLY enjoyed the strawberries!

Good Friends

The whole weekend was made so much sweeter because we were able to spend it with our good friends the Birds.  Friday night we had a perfect night of eating Thai takeout on the lawn while watching what seemed to be a fireworks show competition between some neighbors down the street, while the girls all stayed up late and ran around the yard screaming and laughing.

 Here's the Birds' sweet little Victoria.

CMan!

Noel and Benjamin

Praxis Kiddos

Fireworks!

Our neighborhood has a CRAZY amount of fireworks.  We chose to not even go to one of the city fireworks displays because there were huge fireworks going off in every direction and we could enjoy awesome displays without having to fight crowds and traffic.  Really, it went on all weekend; some people might find that annoying but I loved every boom, whistle, and scream!

Safety Instructions

'Rora and her sparkler

The Pattersons

The Ockenfels

Sandi and Tori

Our Greta

Aaron and Nathan

Baseball and Badger . . .

 . . . were just two of the many highlights of our week with Nonni and Uncle Jon in June.

 The baseball game on a Friday night was the Dust Devils' home opener complete with fireworks, so we took the opportunity to celebrate Father's Day a little early.  We had such a blast!  I'm pretty sure it's the first baseball game my mom has ever actually enjoyed.

Not only was it fireworks night, but also $1 hotdogs and small drinks!  Even Grace has probably had pop less than a dozen times in her lifetime -- they were pumped!

Elias just looking cute!

We stayed for the whole event including the fireworks afterwards, resulting in some very tired girls.

Despite a little of what we call rain in the tri-cities, we ventured out to conquer Badger Mountain  on Saturday morning.  4 kids 6 and under and one grandma with a broken arm barely even slowed us down.

The view from the top.

Devoted Uncle

After an intense game of playground tag at our local elementary school in which Grace opted to leap from the play structure landing on Uncle Jon, trusting that he would catch her and allow himself to be tagged, rather than allow her to fall to the ground, we had the great fortune of an impromtu sprinkler shower.

Monday we went out for opening day of cherry season!  Since this is the first time in 10 years we've lived outside Big 10 Country we have to find something to get geared up for :)  It's a great U-pick experience for kids because there is a lot of fruit and plenty of it is at their eye-level. 

On the last day of their visit we headed to the local splash pad -- fun times!

Such a memorable visit -- just wish they had stayed longer!  Love you, Nonni and Uncle Jon!

Burger King - this one's for Papa!

Since we moved to the Tri-Cities, Papa (Steve's dad) has sent the kids Burger King gift cards a couple of times which have provided us with great excuses to get out of the house on a number of occasions. What makes it even better is that all the Burger King's around here have playlands!  The last time we were there I got some great photos of the kiddos that I subsequently had some fun with. Thanks Papa!

 Notice the chicken nugget in the mouth.

Ezekiel George - Special Ops

Seattle pt. 2

A few weeks after we had the chance to explore Seattle with Nonni and Poppi, Steve had a day's worth of work to do in Tacoma so we all tagged along and made a weekend of it. We spent Friday at Point Defiance Park in Tacoma while he was working at the University there, then headed up to Seattle where we enjoyed Embassy Suites breakfast, the Bremerton Ferry ride, exploring the beach there -- we made it kind of a trial run field trip for our exploration of aquatic ecosystems we're planning for science this fall.  Here are some of the highlights:

When we first dropped Steve off at work and headed to Point Defiance - the most amazing city park I've ever been to. Out of all the things to do there, my kids, of course, chose the beach.  As we arrived, a couple of people from the park's aquarium were setting up a demonstration for a school group that hadn't arrived yet, so we crashed it :)

Grace found this fine specimen all on her own!

It was NOT warm - maybe in the low 60's, but that never stopped my crew from living dangerously when it comes to the probability of getting wet!

Best attempt at a group shot -- Elias did NOT want to sit on that log, and since I was by myself I didn't have a lot of options as far as keeping him on while getting the camera far enough away to take the photo.

Love this!  It just captures his personality!

And now we're totally in the water . . . Did I mention it was cold?  They obviously don't care!

That tiny black bump is a seal that we spotted from the beach.

The rhododendrun all over Tacoma are so huge it took me awhile to figure out what they even were.  In the park they have an entire rhododendrun garden that we didn't get to because we spent 3.5 hrs at the beach and because kids would much rather search for little sea creatures than look at flowers that they aren't allowed to pick.

Other wildlife we came across:

Best of the bunch from attempt #2 to get a group shot on my own. Again, Elias did NOT want to cooperate. He was way past ready for a nap.

My beautiful girls:

 Enjoying the view of the Seattle skyline from the ferry.

 Grace in her element.

 Just checkin' out whats livin' in the log.

 Zeke being Zeke.  Those dimples are going to get him into trouble.

 I think boots and rolled up jeans are going to be our school uniforms :)

Much better attempt at a group shot at Snoqualmie Falls on our way home to the east side.  Note: 1. Steve and I were both there. 2. We bribed them with juice boxes. 3. No E.