The 4th in the North

Thanks for all the comments on Brian's deck. We received so many compliments it reminded me of how many people read this thing so I thought I better keep going.










This town LOVES the 4th of July. It is one of my fav holidays and I was excited to take in all the events Dickinson had to offer.
Starting on Friday night we went to something called a "street dance". I had never heard of this and so we went to see what it was. Definition: a reunion of locals in the middle of downtown with a surprisingly decent band who are all drinking. So, not so much fun for us but we got to see what it was at least. Very interesting.


Then on Saturday we went THE parade. I personally also love parades. I went to them or was in parades all throughout growing up. This parade lasted 1hr! With no marching bands. It was really cool. They threw so much candy and each class (1950, 1960, 1970, 1980, 1990, 2000, and 2010) all had floats (unpomped) that they sat on. Very entertaining. The boys loved it. We had ridden our bikes to Joel and Fawn's and then walked to the mile long parade. Also, the govenor was there. Are you serious? I have never seen Brad Henry in Weatherford. I guess it is a lot easier in a small town, and when you are running for the Senate. Then we had a nice lunch at Fawn's. She is very Southern Living meets Martha Stewart.

Then... we went to this art in the park exhibit. Basically an arts and crafts show on the universities campus. It was beautiful as you can see in the pics. They also had a family fun day, but the boys had to nap at some point!

As you can tell Brian's brother Aaron has been with us on and off through the summer. I think he actually enjoyed his 4th of July with us. He is single ladies, although I don't know if any single ladies read this that are at least close to his age. Anyways the boys have loved having him here.








The reason we built the deck so quickly was b/c we had a 4th of July party. If you know us at all you know we love to have parties, whatever the occasion- birthday, engagement, holiday, holiday we don't even celebrate- whatever. Plus, this was the most logical step to avoid risking another terrible holiday away from family.

So, we had 2 families over, (who were also far far away from home) Fawn and Joel, that is Brian's boss and Fawn is one of my bf's here. They have a son Graves who is 10 months. Fawn is actually from Bixby. Then we had Kristina and Robert over. They just moved from Houston, he works for Marathon, and I met her at the Redbox. It is easy to tell when someone is not from ND and I could tell she WAS NOT so I talked to her. We have hit if off really well and several of us migratory folks have started playdates in the park. Kristina has a son John David that is 2.

So, we had ribs, baked beans, potato salad, dip, watermelon, deviled eggs, homemade ice cream and cookie cake. It was delish! Again, I do like to take pics of my food creations. It doesn't look that great despite the time Aaron and I worked on it but it does have 13 stripes and 50 stars and there were no left overs.
After dinner we had some fireworks that we played with in the backyard, safely! Notice Gma, the pick of Baker fully supervised with the sparkler-lol. I bought the fireworks, all $28 worth and apparently my childhood memories have imporved as I have gotten older b/c I was SO excited about the chicken and snake fireworks. I had been talking these things up for days. Now, I don't know if my dad bought different ones for us but Brian was a bit disappointed. They weren't very cool, but Baker loved them. It was pretty funny, I was surprised that neither of my children were scared of the fireworks at all. What a relief!

The city of Dickinson put on a great fireworks show at 10pm where we were bundled in coats and hoodies b/c it was chilly. We went to Kristina's to watch the show b/c we lived too far away.







Someday I will learn how to post pictures in order and align them with the words I write about them, but for now-
Thanks for reading and enjoy your freedom