4th of July

There is something about the 4th of July that makes me absolutely love it.  Growing up, my family spent the majority of our fourths at Lake Powell.  I grew to love that place and whenever I thought of the fourth of July, I always thought of Lake Powell.  I could never imagine spending my Independence Days anywhere else.  Fourth of July was all about camping, jet skiing, cruising in the boat, wakeboarding, and fireworks on the lake.

Well, it's been a few years since I've spent the fourth at the lake, three years to be exact.  Ever since we got married, something has prevented us from celebrating there.  We have either been thousands of miles away or had work schedules that prevented us from going.  This year was the same old story.  But even though my heart yearns for those fourths on the lake, I have realized I still love the fourth of July as much as I always have, no matter where I celebrate it.  If given the choice though, I'd go back to Lake Powell every time in a heartbeat. I love that place.

This year our fourth was the definition of a summer day.  We slept in as long as we felt like and then headed to Seven Peaks.  We swam and enjoyed the scorching hot Utah summer heat.  We enjoyed the carnival in downtown Provo and spent the rest of the afternoon being lazy.  We finished the day off with a BBQ with family and friends and watched the fireworks off in the distance.  We couldn't have asked for a better day.  

^^Miss Makayla June^^

^^Brothers thinking alike in their bright blue shirts. :)^^

^^I think I also love the 4th so much for the excuse it gives me to color coordinate with my love. Hehe.^^

^^Millie Dog^^

^^Watching the fireworks.^^

WE LOVE THE USA!! 

**4th of July**

I had big plans for this 4th of July, and I mean big ones. I had made one of my trusty lists of all of the things I wanted to make and do for the fourth and was overjoyed when my new friend Haley shared these same desires. Haley is awesome, by the way. If we are lucky she will be starting a blog of her own very soon. She has tons of good stuff to share.

Well, she and I may not have been the very best planners/preparers/time managers for this big shindig we were wanting to do. But we were oblivious to that very important bit of information until it was too late to do anything about it. We took a good three hours shopping around, finding absolutely everything we thought we needed, stopped into Qdoba (best quesadilla I've ever had) and got our lunch to stay, and finally decided to head back to our apartments at like 3:30 in the afternoon. 

We thought we had it all under control. We'd start on our baking, get ourselves all dolled up for the big event and have plenty of time to spare to set everything up before the husbands & co-workers got home from work around 8:30ish. Right?? Wrong. Husbands get off work early, cake pops haven't been dipped, massive rainstorm rolls in and ruins our plans of having the party poolside, not enough raspberries to top all of the cupcakes, and the list goes on and on. 

But after all was said and done, it was a great party. It may not have been everything we were hoping or imagining it would be, but it was fun. Makes me realize that not everything needs to go just exactly how I want it to be. Sometimes when you just go with the flow and don't stress out too much, you end up with the best results. Yeah our cake pops weren't as good as Bakerella's, but they were so dang tasty! The strawberries may not have been dipped to perfection, but they had character. And looking back now, its not the stress that stands out the most in my mind, it really is the feelings that were felt that day and the fun that we all had together.