Surviving and Celebrating

I love the 4th of July. The parades, the red white and blue, and fireworks! And since we came here. . . the carnival! Well we really don't go on the rides much but it's still exciting to walk around and see others doing so. We always tell the kids we are saving our money for better rides and they go along with our cheapo ways.

Kennon and Savannah though, were at a sleepover at the Cardon's so I had to do something really fun for the younger two so they wouldn't be too sad. So I said, one ride each. Two rides cost $7! Camille chose wisely and had a great time on the swings.

Caroline, on the other hand decided to be bold and brave the exact same ride that scared her to death at age four. This time she had no plans of screaming at the top of her lungs to stop until they did. Here she is bursting with excitement and courage. No idea what terror she is about to face.And 10 seconds later. (You HAVE to blow it up. Click on it and check out the complete turn of events)

She was way more direct than the "I don't like it!"she screamed at the Carney at age four. This time she never let up screaming looking him straight on, "Stop the ride! I hate it! I hate it!" She knew from past experience that they would stop for her if she screamed loud enough. The guy was more than happy to get the possessed child off his ride. Especially when she started trying to climb out while in motion. He said she gave him a heart attack and muttered about her the whole rest of the ride. We better stick to the carousel with this girl.

And Marcus better find another sport. He took fourth place winner in the Riverside beautiful baby contest, which means he LOST. Another 16 month old baby boy with HAIR, wife beater tank top, necklace, and a big ridiculous looking red, white and blue bow taped to his bottom won first prize. Should've considered the neighborhood and dressed him right. They don't think too much of the farmer brown types around these parts.

Heading down to the park for an afternoon walking around the carnival on Friday. We were babysitting a friend. She didn't like the no ride policy. I had to tell her NO at least a dozen times. My favorite line was, "Awe, Come on! That's what a carnival is for!" Give her a break, though. She's pretty much an only child and doesn't understand how big families work. There are always worms for sale a block away since we live right by the river.

July 4th was Marcus's 16 month birthday.

Brent will be home soon. Not telling when just in case you are a bad guy. It may be even be tonight.

I miss him but love how self reliant I have become in his absence. The day after he left I decided to take the couch apart at the seams. I was missing a library DVD, had searched the entire house and only had one place left. I paused for a second trying to decide how Brent would feel about me pulling out the staples under the couch but ultimately began tearing into it. I can't fork out 31.99 for the DVD until I know that I'm not sitting on it. So I pulled out a bunch of staples and found all kinds of stuff down there -my favorite shoe of Marcus's gone missing last December, our VCR remote that had left us with no abilty to rewind, books, socks, way too much food. . . but NO stinkin' 31.99 DVD. Camille and Caroline's jobs were to feel for objects and tell mom where to pull out staples. Savannah held the flashlight up the crack and showed me where to reach in. She won't let us post any of those pictures because they are all close ups of her behind up in the air. Kennon was the photographer. Marcus grabbed my screwdriver any time it was free and worked his head off too.

Making lots of adjustments and did not like it when his mother disturbed him from some serious tinkering.

Sure is nice to still have a man around the house since Dad's out of town.

Last night we invited guests over for dinner and I BBQ'd for the first time ever. No fires, and the chicken kabobs were perfect. It was totally easy! For now on I may start manning the grill and letting him multi-task the rest of the stuff in the kitchen.

I also blew the breaker the day after he left. The microwave, oven, computer, TV, fridge - everything was off. Usually that means -wait for Brent to get home and flip switches somewhere in the basement- so I initially panicked. But in less than 5 minutes I had us up and running again. If only I could get the lawn mower up and running I would be feeling fabulous.

We even survived the July 4th holiday on our own, although barely. We brought an older lady I visiting teach to our ward party Saturday evening. She called earlier to tell me that she had something for the kids. After dinner she pulled out some "sparklers" for them to set off. She had just got the lighter out of her purse and was holding it out so I could light them up when Taylor Hawes happened by and said, "Those are not sparklers! They are bottle rockets and you're gonna blow your hand off!"

Brent usually lights the sparklers and hands them out. They obviously weren't sparklers once I took a second look but I just took her word for it. Thank you so much Taylor for saving us. Donna wouldn't believe they weren't sparklers though. She called me the next day to see if we had lit them up yet. I told her once again that they weren't what she thought they were, but she insisted that she and her neighbors had used sparklers just like that.

Donna lives downtown and by the time we got her back to her place after the party it was after 10 p.m. and there were fireworks going on all around us. The kids were upset about the downtown detour since now we were sure to miss our firework show in the tree house. I decided to go straight up Niagara Street so we wouldn't miss anything on the way. Two miles from the park/our house traffic slowed to a crawl. When we realized that we weren't going anywhere anytime soon they were all complaining at me for ruining everything. Then we suddenly noticed that we were right in the middle of the show. People packed both sides of the road. We opened the sunroof, hung out the top and blasted the stereo, for our first drive through firework show. They were coming down all around us and we made it home and up in the tree house just in time for the finale. It was a very exciting fireworks show after all.

I am really loving summer! I know it has a lot to do with being in the city rather than on a farm. No canning, weeding, or slaving away in the hot sun around here. You just run out of chores so much sooner and have a lot more time for fun. I don't know if that is a bad thing or not. I like fun. But I don't want to raise good for nothing kids.