"It's Independence Day"

the initial crowd of teens and kids in our back yard.

Can you see the crowd of tots around the sandbox? We love our back yard!!

Buck & Max pre-party

The bouncy house was a big hit, even in the rain.

A rare sighting of the Dads - Charlie's dad (with little brother, Ben) & RKZ at the grill.

D Max. He is nearly Buck's age & a great kid (little brother of the girls with the USA nails:)

Buck & Charlie take a milk break during the action.

another shot of the bouncy house.

Em's patriotic hands - I love Canadian teenagers!!

"Up with Hope - down with Dope" - Hope also showing her red white and blue

The sisters show off their support for US (get it - us and the U.S.? I'm so clever)

My "o-so-Martha" flag cake.
A few days (ok, 3) late - but I wanted to post the pictures of our 4th of July blow out (ha!ha!). There were (in my dismal count) 33 people at the party and 10 of these were adults. There was a bit of rain & a good amount of food. RKZ & I only had minimal fights where each of our priorities took the upper hand. I wanted unlimited play time fun for the kids and he wanted to get the drinks together. Hmmm - interesting observation of us, I think.
It was so fun to have a party again. We've had a few people over for dinner, but to have an actual party was such a new thing in Canada for us. I have to admit that I was a bit more stressed than I would have liked to be. The rain made me kinda' crazy as we had to figure out how to accommodate everyone.
Our friends themselves are all amazing. We invited families who hadn't really met before, but all have kids of similar ages. It was a good mix, I think (they might all say different things). One friend did say, "I just love not having to cook!" which could be positive, but could be just a nice thing to say...(insert smile here). I do think that the best way to ward off homesickness of the 4th is to throw a big party. I barely missed the fireworks and craziness of California. Our one sadness was not ordering fireworks for the party (semi-legal, of course). It would have been fun to pass out sparklers.
This morning Clemmie is home from Toronto and now over at our house and fighting with Buck in the backyard swimming pool.

It's a good thing Buck will be at school 2 days a week in the winter. I don't know how we'll do with a return to being constantly inside!

Hi to the Maxwells!! I love you!!!