4th of July in Seeley Lake

It's clearly a tradition now! I don't recall one 4th of July in the past 5 or 6 years that we haven't gone out to Seeley Lake. This year was no different! 

We headed out to the cabin around 10:30, a little behind schedule, but since Perry and I stayed up until 1:30a the night before playing Dominos, we opted to sleep in a little bit. Can you blame us? When we arrived, we had a quick bathroom break before we piled back into the truck with Grandma to head downtown to reserve our spot on the side of the road. We were in the same area that we were last year, but on the opposite side of the road. Since we still had about 2 hours before the parade actually started, we walked to The Ice Cream Place for lunch, and ice cream of course! Like usual, the place was swarming with people so it took about half and hour just to get our food, if not longer! We made it back with a few minutes to spare. It was a super long walk with 3 kids...

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Before the parade started, Hunter and JP sat eagerly in their chairs with Grandma waiting and waiting for the parade to begin. 

Charlotte was a trooper! It was 2pm before she finally had a moment to take a little snooze! Knowing that she would be exhausted, we brought the swing for her, and within minutes she was out. I wanted to join her!

  The forest service handed out frisbees again this year. The look on JP's face was priceless when they handed him a yellow one, as the guy had an armful of green ones. He went from excited when he saw all the green frisbees to a solid pout when he was handed a yellow one and then right into pure excitement when he realized it was a frisbee. All within 10 seconds. He is so animated!

 This was his face when the *green* Shriner's cars were racing around in circles. Excited they were green, but what are those old guys doing on those small cars?

 Hunter kind of kept to himself during the parade and wasn't too keen on picking up candy. But JP loved the majority of it. The Blackfoot suburban had their back wipers going so the flag was waving. JP thought this was HILARIOUS! And "Look! Santa is strapped to that truck carrying the watermelon!"

 When Hunter and JP (and mom, dad, and Grandma) saw this coming, we ALL took shelter so we didn't end up soaking wet like last year!

 The adults stepped back by the truck, Hunter climbed into the back of the truck, and JP hid behind my chair. One of the first entries in the parade was a fire truck, and he hid behind me when he first saw it, 2 blocks away... Needless to say, no one got wet on our side of the road this year. Woohoo!

 The boys came out of hiding when they saw "Mater". 

Charlotte woke up around the time the boys were fussing about the fire trucks. But she woke up just in time to be thrown popsicles. How did she she get away with two, and the boys only one? Easy - green popsicles were the *cool* thing.  

 I was so glad to get back to the cabin because I was exhausted, and so was everyone else. The boys napped for a little bit, Grandma had a short nap, but Perry, Charlotte and I didn't get up until 6:30! At that point, we all headed down to river to have a campfire. JP was excite that his hot dog actually had his name on it! Charli ate a ton and I somehow caught her mid-blink...

 The weather was perfect for a campfire. Not too hot, not too breezy. Just perfect. 

 Once the boys finished eating, they went down near the river to whack some stuff. They would do this all day if you let them. 

 We pulled the jeep out of the shop for the first time this year to take down to the lake to watch the fireworks. Charlotte had fun playing in the front seat as we gathered up everything we needed.

 Before we left, I insisted I get a *decent* picture of the 3 of my kids. I was thrilled one turned out!

 This is how they usually turn out...

Why can't you all look at the same time?!

 Before marking our spot on the lake shore, we hit up The Ice Cream Place again and bought a few fireworks for the boys for when we got back home. 

 There were TONS of people there! I think this is the 2nd time we watched the fireworks over the lake. The boys spent their time before the show running up the hill and rolling down. Hunter could really get rolling! JP could also get rolling pretty quick but it took him twice as long to get down because he would end up rolling across the hill instead of down. More in a zig-zag pattern than anything. They were fun to watch!

Hunter is in the green jacket, and JP is at the top of the hill in the grey jacket. It's a little fussy because I couldn't see the screen on my camera very well, but you get the picture!

The boys snuggled in with Grandma to watch the show. I was nervous about Charlotte not liking the fireworks because she typically doesn't like loud noises. She surprised the heck out of me! She laid between my legs and talked and giggled the whole show. It was adorable!

 The boys were *very* eager to light off fireworks at the cabin once we got back. They were thrilled about sparklers!

 And were very good about shouting cautions to dad. "Don't touch it dad! It's on fire!"

In the morning they did a few more sparklers before Perry lit the snake, also known as the "snakeler". Hopefully we'll be able to carry on our tradition next year!