4th of July

Happy 4th of July! That is one hot Granny Ju! Woot woo! PS that's my mom. Here she is, Miss America! So cute right? Talia gave us the outfit for Taya's bday. This is Kim's little girl Milee. She looks exactly like her parents and she likes to tease and won't smile when told to. (PS Kim is my sister) My handsome little guy at the parade. McKoy and Taylor at the parade. Taylor is Kim's little guy. Miss America and her daddy. This is another Miss America. This is Jaxyn my cousin Talia's daughter. Isn't she beautiful? She and Mataya will be in the same grade. Miss America and her mommy.

Mikey's water balloon toss game before it started. Notice people are still smiling. BTW that's not Talia in the front that is her mini me Cheyenna. They look identical. Almost.

The water balloon toss in mid throw.

This is Jeanette breaking a balloon on Richard. If you know Richard you would know this is hilarious.

My brother's daughter Gracie. She is also going to be in the same grade as Mataya. She is too cute.

McKoy and my little sis Brianna doing sparklers in my driveway. This wasn't actually on the fourth of July but I felt like the sparklers made it belong to this post.

A little boy that had a little too much fun on the fourth of July. Sometimes they sleep in the cutest positions.

Ok so the fourth was way fun as usual. I heart the fourth of July so much. We do the exact same thing every year and to regular people it seems stupid but to me it is the time of my life. I make fun of our traditions but I secretly love them. When I was six years old we moved to Canada for 4 years. During that time I was so sad to miss out on our family stuff and ever since we moved back I haven't wanted to miss a thing. Most of my family on my mom's side lives here in Cedar. We get together nearly weekly for someones birthday, a ball game, holidays, or just to hang out. It's not just a few people. We are talking about thirty people or more. Anyway, the fourth is no different. We all go to the parade in the morning. We all park at my grandma's/aunt Maye's/aunt Guyla's house. They all live next door to each other which is on 100 East across the street from the park and city library. It makes parking easy. At the parade we sit in front of Lin's on the corner by the old KFC. (It's now 2brothers communications) Then we walk over to the the park. We set our lawn chairs up in the corner by the pavilion where the Lions club parks their trailer. Many folks think the trailer is ours, and have even asked to use the bathroom in it. However it doesn't belong to the redneck clan surrounding it. We just like to sit there. We eat on average three park burgers each. We walk around and have a mini high school reunion. We see people we haven't seen since the previous fourth of July. It's a great time had by all. In the old days we ran the races but they haven't done the races since McKoy was 2. When I ran the races as a kid I would win a dollar or sometimes a little plastic trophy. Good times. Anyway, after a few hours of mingling we pack up our chairs and head down the street to my Aunt Maye's house. It is between my grandpa's and my aunt Guyla's. It's actually the house my grandpa grew up in. Five kids in a two bedroom house. Crazy. Anyway it's been remodeled and now has 4 bedrooms. So back to the fourth of July. So we sit at Maye's eating watermelon and Popsicles. We sit out there all day. (But this year I had to take my kids home for a nap after a couple of hours.) Then we head to someones house for a BBQ. This year it was Kim's house. I think it was last year too. So it's a BYO meat party. (Bring your own meat) We barbecue steaks and everyone brings a salad or dessert or something. We eat A LOT! This year Kim's husband Mikey wanted to play a water balloon game. Everyone had a partner and tossed a water balloon back and forth while getting further and further away from each other. The last people with their water balloon still in tact won. It was fun except it sort of turned into a water balloon fight and it was like 9:00 at night and it got cold. Ok so then we do redneck fireworks on Kim's driveway and watch the city fireworks. Last year the cops came because we were letting of illegal fireworks my cousin got in Wyoming. Like I said it's a redneck party. Most people would think these activities are boring but if you knew our group, we are pretty easily entertained. If you wish to participate in any of the above activities you won't have to wait long because we do the exact same thing on the 24th of July. And anyone is invited. We have seriously had all sorts of crazies join us and won't mind if you want to also:)