4th of July

I love the holidays that bring together family and friends! And last week for the 4th, we were able to get together with some of our friends to celebrate! First we met up in the afternoon for a swim, which felt quite nice, even though it wasn't a super hot day. Ellie got to play around, go from friend to friend, and be in her little floaty we got her last year. Next, we had some friends over at our place for dinner and to hang out while we waited for the fireworks. It was a beautiful afternoon and evening to be outside, and we certainly enjoyed it on our back patio. (I am thoroughly loving our new table, pergola and lights out there!!!) And last on the agenda was fireworks at a park, up on a hill, over looking another parks professional fireworks.
Steven hasn't really experienced fireworks like we did that night. He was born and raised in Alaska, and during the summer it's the land of the midnight sun. Therefore, no one really does any type of fireworks-you can't get the full affect. When we went to college here, we always went back home during the summers. And last year (our first July here after moving back to Idaho) we were home bound due to Ellie's new sleep schedule, and we didn't do anything on our road either. So on our drive to the park that night, Steven was surprised to see people hanging out in their front yards and setting fireworks off in the streets. Then, when we got to the lookout at the park for the actual event, we could see TONS of people setting off their own all around the city. It was blowing Steven's mind, and it even surprised me, how big some of them were for not being the "professional" park ones we were waiting for. Ellie was a bit out of that evening. We had put her down for about a hour half before we needed to leave for the park. When we woke her back up, she was like, what's going on? But she was chill and wanted to be held amongst a few of us the rest of the night. The fireworks weren't super close and loud, making it a less than big deal to her. We enjoyed them though and it was a nice end to the night!

^^ Picture on left is from last year. Picture on right is from this year. 

Same floaty and awesome dad though!

 had to be a bit festive you know?!

^^this isn't from the 4th...I didn't get a good one that night. But I want to show off the new set up!

Steven built the table all by himself! We do still need to find some (metal) chairs to make it complete.

^^this picture by no means is a good capture of the fireworks. I really only took one picture while they were happening, and of course it was a small one. Plus, with it being on my iPhone, late at night, etc, I wasn't going to get a good picture anyways. 

BUT, I wanted to kind of capture the lookout. Also, to the left of even this picture you could see waaay more of the city (cities) and more fireworks happening!