24th of July!!

It's a camp out!  We had not planned on camping out for the parade until we had a wild idea to drive the parade route and check out a good place to go watch the parade the next morning.  We drove downtown before noon and people were already camping out so we figured that we should go home and grab some chairs and a tarp and claim a spot for ourselves.  We drove home, got our stuff, went back downtown and found a great spot.  As we began to set up we noticed a couple of police officers that were moving peoples belongings.  We asked them what was going on and they told us that people could not camp out or reserve their spots until 8:00 that night.  We headed back home and decided that instead of taking another trip downtown and then back home again that we would just go for it and attempt the crazy downtown camp out.  We went a little early and arrived shortly after 7:00 to find even more people were all set up.  We found a GREAT spot on 900 S and about 450 East.  It was a park strip in front of a small business.  The business owner was sitting on his porch with his kids and we asked him if we could camp out there and he said yes and also offered his driveway for us to park in.  Later that night he was doing some fireworks in his backyard with his kids and invited us to join.  To make things even better, he let us use his bathroom, yay, no Porta potty!!!

The kids did pretty well!  Sebastian went to bed the earliest of all.  Gabe and Abby decided that there was too much going on for them to go to sleep.  Austin had his laptop all charged up so he was quite content.  Gabe and Abby finally went to sleep a little after midnight.  We followed shortly after but it was one crazy loud night!  All night long people were driving up and down 900 south honking their horns, yelling, laughing, talking (loud), etc...  We woke up around 6:00 am and set up our chairs on the street for the parade.

She loved her Tiara!  I remember loving these as a little girl.

There's my cute little family, enjoying the parade!

The parade was over around 11:30, we packed up our things and headed home.  Well not before we exchanged contact information with the business owner that was so generous, you never know we may do it again next year!  

Later that evening we had family over to our house for a grill out, swimming, and fireworks.  Heide, Elisabeth, and Lillie were in town from Las Vegas, they brought their really good friend Michelle, her baby, and her niece.  Mindi, Chandler, Noah, Ingrid, Mia, Niklaus, Grandpa Jim, Nana, my Mom, also came over and then of course all of us.

The kids went crazy in the pool and had a great time!

My kids really really enjoyed the sparklers!

The bigger kids had fun helping Vinnie light the big fireworks.

I think we were out there til somewhere around 11:00.  Both Sebastian and Abby fell asleep outside and Gabe had no complaints when it was time to go upstairs to bed.
What a fun holiday this is for us!  Happy 24th to all you Utah peeps!