A 4th full of fun!

We had so much fun this past week, we really wore ourselves out, so that by the time Sunday came we didn't want to do anything! (yes, we did get up for 8:30 AM church! It was tough, but we did it.)

So here's what we've been up to this last week. Richard got Friday off from work so he took Wednesday and Thursday off as well to play! It was great! Hard part was to have Monday come around.

We decided to get adventurous on Friday and hike to the Timp caves. Little did we know that by the time we'd get there, there would be a 5 1/2 hour wait for the cave tours. Yeah, we didn't hike Timp. Maybe another day when we feel motivated to wake up at 6 am and try it! So, we hiked the Y on the mountain above BYU. No, we didn't take Sara, there's no way! But, we took the boys and they really liked it.

Then we brought the kids home and decided to let them cool off and play in the water while mom and dad die on the couch. I still have no idea where they get all their energy! Here they are finally relaxing on the steps.

After a while, we got our second wind and took the kids down to Provo to go to the Freedom Days Festival. They close off center street and fill it with way-too-expensive rides and food and tons of booths of people trying to sell their 'stuff'! It was CRAZY! But amazingly enough, Ethan wanted to go on the 'Tornado' ride so I let Richard be the chaperone. Ethan loved it. Richard didn't. Neither of us can stomach rides like we used to. It was pretty funny though! Then to my shock Preston wanted to go on it!! Now, if you know my kids, they don't venture out and do rides much. So when Preston says he wants to go, I'll pay the high price to get the tickets and get him on it! Thankfully our friend Steve seemed brave enough to go on it with the boys! :) (Since Richard was out of commission and I was getting over a headache. Yeah, I know, excuses.)

The next morning (Sat. the 4th) we ventured out way too early and went to the hot air balloon festival. It was really cool! Well worth getting up early for.

The parade came next and you know, people really are crazy in Utah county when it comes to this parade. They literally stake out spots and sleep there until the next day when it's the parade. You'd think someone famous was going to be there! We couldn't find anywhere to sit until 5am saturday morning! It was nuts. But, we wanted to go since Richard's dad was in charge of creating one of the floats and it was a really cool float!

We continued the day with bar-b-ques, swimming and fireworks at night! So by the time Sunday rolled around, we made sure to just hang out at home, sleep and drink lots of fluids!!