Not quite Wordless Wednesday

My youngest son holding his little niece Miss Pippa

Summer time

It's been a couple weeks since I posted, pretty quiet since the 4th of July.  We had a great day with family and friends.  We were a little late for the balloon launch, but we got there in time to see them fly.

We loved The Amazing Spider-Man

Sitting around gabbing 

The girls and I just made ourselves comfy while the boys had 
a good time setting off 'tons' of fireworks!  

My niece and daughter in law

We have lived in our home for over 20 years, my neighbors are not
only our friends but have become an extension of our family.

Our garden is starting to produce some yummy veggies, our first tomato and banana peppers arrived.  We are waiting for a couple more tomato's so we can enjoy a big fat BLT:

Utah is now in the dog days of summer, the heat has been so crazy over 100 degrees for multiple days.  The air doesn't seem to move.  
In our area of the woods this also means plenty of fires in the mountains, at one point we had fires on 3 of our mountain ranges, we actually had ash falling on us in our back yard.  Since then we have had a couple good  rain storms and I think all the fires are out now.

It looked like a volcano was going off, luckily no houses were lost in this fire.

Now that the grand kids have gone back to Georgia and the 4th is over I have been trying to decide what project I want to get started on in the house, the dreaded basement closet (still full of my boys 'stuff'), the garage (ugh to hot),  old family video's organized and digitally redone, the list goes on...

I also must admit I  have really enjoyed these last few months on my own schedule, with no job, but I am starting to look around and throw my resume out to a few places.  I miss the extra spending money and before we know it the holidays will be here, and by then I will have 3 cute grand babies to buy for:) http://www.xmasclock.com/  

Heat, Ma'am!  it was so dreadful here, that I found there was nothing left for it but to take off my flesh and sit in my bones.  ~ Sydney Smith, Lady Holland's Memoir


The summer night is like a perfection of thought. ~ Wallace Stevens

Balloons, Parades, Friends, Family, and Fireworks!

I love the 4th of July! My family would agree it is as big as Christmas around our home.  
For 20 plus years we have been up at 5:30 am on the 4th we head to Fox Field so that we can walk around as they inflate a field full of hot air balloons.  


There is something quite magical in the air as the first balloon launches with the American flag high in the air against the back drop of our mountains and the sun rising... not to mention the Star Spangled Banner being played over the loud speakers.  It just starts the day off perfectly.  

We then enjoy a pancake breakfast provided by the local veterans.  

 If truth were told I am probably the one that enjoys the parade the most.  I love cheering as the local high school bands go by, I love the jets flying over, the boom of the cannons as the parade starts.  The kids running around diving for candy, the veterans that go marching by and how the crowd rises to our feet with hands on hearts, the floats, the noise, ahh, I love it all!

Our little nephew loving the firetruck and all it's bells and whistles

Neighbors, Friends and Family, does it get any better!

From here we usually pile back in the car and head to the local theater to see the summer block buster, this year it will be Spiderman.  The coolness of the theatre is perfect after sitting in the sun for 3 hours.


Then it's time to go home and put some hot dogs and hamburgers on the grill eat our selves sick and then head outside for the parachute fireworks.

These are the fireworks that should be let off during the day, they have army men attached to parachutes that we launch and then the neighborhood kids run and around trying to catch them.

We then all crash in the family room to watch Independence Day with Will Smith and nap during the heat of the day.  We need to prepare for the long night of fireworks ahead.


This has varied over the years, some years we head to Stadium of Fire and some years we are the 'Neighborhood of Fire', setting off our own mass amount of fireworks.  


I am so grateful for the freedoms we enjoy, for this wonderful country we live in, for the men and women who have gone before and those who are serving us today.  


I hope everyone has a wonderful 4th of July!

You have to love a nation that celebrates its Independence every July 4, not with a parade of guns, tanks, and soldiers who file by the White House in a show of strength and muscle, but with family picnics where kids throw Frisbees, the potato salad gets iffy, and the flies die from happiness.  You may think you have overeaten, but it is patriotism.

~Erma Bombeck

"Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or ill, we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe, to assure the survival and success of liberty"

~John F. Kennedy