The 4th of July

We had such a great, relaxing, fun, family filled day on the 4th! I wish I could have had some video of the kids playing together so well and just being entertained all day, but our video camera is not holding a charge. I bought a new battery, but it still doesn't want to work unless it's plugged in, (and I somehow misplaced the cord), so I didn't bring it : ( But I took A LOT of pictures : )

My sister is up in WA now too & they had been camping just and hour and a half away, so we met up with them. Sidney was SO excited to get to play with her cousins again. She hadn't seen them for 5+ weeks.

As soon as we got there the girls were in the water.....Sidney couldn't get her bathing suit on fast enough!

Pretty soon it was the kids turn to get to go out in the boat.

There were only 3 life vests, so they had to take turns. I was amazed that Sidney went in by herself......

...while the boys opted to stay IN the boat.

The guys managed to squeeze in some time for poker too.....Carter & Cameron REALLY wanted to play with them.

There were some other games to play there too : )

Cameron and Kendall were having fun peeking out the little doors in the tent.

The guys were taking a turn at getting the ropes with the balls on the end onto the stand.

Madeline and Sidney got some good bonding in.

Now the girls take a turn at this game.

Cameron gets some squeezes in with Daddy while Uncle Jason shakes up the ice cream.

Carter was so cute drumming on this ice chest.

The girls were at his game for quite awhile.

Making this homemade ice cream turned out to be quite the task.......everybody was taking turns shaking it up.

Now it was the girls turn.

more fun in the water again.

they all played so great together.

I wanted to get a picture of both of our families all together, but the kids were always off in different directions having fun, and there was a group picture taken when we first got there of EVERYONE that my sister was camping with, mostly my bro-in-laws family...but at least I got one of the two of us.

They were all playing something over in this field...I'm not sure what it was, but I loved the glasses on the boys & Carter's necklace.

They have this whole big production all planned out....it was nice to see them just having fun and being entertained all day.

Then they came over to Chelan this afternoon on their way back up to Bellingham for dinner. The kids didn't want to say goodbye, but we'll see them this weekend briefly when we go up to Bellingham to visit my Dad again for a few days : )

And now, can you believe it???? I am actually caught up for our trip! Ok, now I need to get back to working on that mending pile that's been sitting there for over a year I think. I've made a good dent in it, but boy would it feel good to get it finished!