independence day, the calascione way

we had a fabulous day spent at my mom and dad's house with my family along with russell's parents too. the kids were surrounded by their favorite people in the whole wide world -- their grandparents! Dad cooked hamburgers and hotdogs on the grill and we enjoyed an All-American feast on a perfectly hot summer holiday. grandma and grandpa surprised the kids with a kiddy pool out back and it the kids had a blast playing in the water! (by the way, we are STILL waiting on pool #5 to arrive...that's another story)

the hosts:

sistas, playing legos, like old times:

my two beautiful moms: dad and russ playing a game of horseshoes:

dad's magical fireworks show!

***

July 4th - the day our country became independent! John Adams wrote this to his wife about this historical date:

"The second day of July, 1776, will be the most memorable epoch in the history of America. I am apt to believe that it will be celebrated by succeeding generations as the great anniversary festival. It ought to be commemorated as the day of deliverance, by solemn acts of devotion to God Almighty. It ought to be solemnized with pomp and parade, with shows, games, sports, guns, bells, bonfires, and illuminations, from one end of this continent to the other, from this time forward forever more."

Isn't that a beautiful quote? The Declaration was actually first signed on July 2nd, but it was debated by Congress and finally approved two days later. I also discovered that both signors of the Declaration, Thomas Jefferson and John Adams, died, ironically, on July 4, 1831, which was our country's 50th anniversary!

Hope you all had a fun, safe and exciting 4th of July!

LET FREEDOM RING

natalie and baby lauren:

she looks so grown up here holding lauren.

the red elephant

a new restaurant popped up near our neighborhood recently and since we heard it was kid friendly we decided to go see what it was all about! the red elephant, specializing in pizza, turned out to be the [WAAAY] modernized version of pizza hut. everything we ordered was delicious but i'm drooling over here right now thinking about the dessert that we ate. they are called elephant ears and they are melt-in-your-mouth-funnel-cake-like HEAVEN!

that was russell eating the elephant ears :)

afterwards, we let the kids throw away some money in the little arcade room...

like daddy, like daughter

natalie decided she wanted to dress up as daddy and helped herself to some of his things in our closet: his work hat, his old leather belt and a pair of his flipflops. after putting everything on, she approached me and announced "look mom, i'm daddy!"

regardless of what MOST people say, i still think she is a spitting image of her daddy (minus the eyes)

a day of "nothing" to do

isn't it funny how one week is completely slammed with stuff you have going on, to the point where you feel like you're about to go insane, and then all of the sudden the next week on your calendar is so bare you are [almost] desperate to find something to do! well, that's how it was for me. this week was pretty low key for us. i decided not to fight the crowds at the free movie today, besides it wasn't a movie i was crazy about taking the kids to see, so i decided at the last minute this morning that we were going to the park! since it's been so ridiculously hot lately, i knew we had to get out of the house early in order to try to 'beat the heat'. luckily (and not surprisingly) we had the park to ourselves today! it was great. and the kids had so much fun, even though they were as red as beets after the first 10 minutes of playing. they took lots of hydration breaks in the shade with me, and we were only there for about 45 minutes so it wasn't too bad.

when i told russ that i had nothing planned for the day, he asked if i would come visit him at work for lunch. so we did just that. i made him a nice BLT sandwich (just what he asked for) and i packed the kids their lunchables meal and straight from the park we went to daddy's work! he works on the other side of town from where we live, so as much as i would love to visit him more often, it's just not that easy. but it was a real treat to spend that time with him at HIS job in HIS element, and the kids loved it too. we should definitely try to do it more often.

it was still early by the time we got home so i was trying to think of something else the kids could do besides being couped up inside this boring house. i was reeeeally wishing that pool #5 had arrived, but it is still being shipped :( i decided we would just throw on our bathing suits and go out back with the slip n slide. i wasn't sure if it would be enough to keep the kids entertained but they were great and we ended up staying out there for a couple of hours very comfortably. there even seemed to be a nice breeze out!

it just goes to show that not everything needs to be planned to turn out successful! sometimes it's a little hard for my type A personality to grasp...

spending father's day at grandpa's

we went to my parent's house for dinner on father's day. decided to brave the heat after we ate:

the kids wanted to help grandpa fill up the birdfeeder:

then they wanted to help him water the lawn:

then grandpa thought it would be fun to spray the kids down w/ the hose:

and they LOVED it!

happy father's day to my wonderful dad, who turned out to be a pretty darn good grandpa too ;)

happy father's day!

... to my amazing husband, my wonderful dad and father in-law, and all the father's out there who make a difference in their children's lives!

some pictures from church this morning:

THIS weekend...

russ didn't work so we had some pool fun with the kids in the back yard.

i got the kids a sponge bob slip and slide

here's my graceful natalie ;)

russell kept trying to drink the water...

russell in time out:

russell helping fill the pool up with water:

this is pool #4 this summer...

- pool #1 (purchased last year) was just like this except green, not blue, and we had to get rid of it because there was a gash on the bottom of it from a toy being underneath.

- pool #2 we bought (last weekend) after shopping around to a few stores with the kids, looking for the perfect pool that would last throughout the summer. the picture on the box showed a cool looking slide and everything! we go to set it up and realize that "objects are smaller than they appear!" on the box it showed 3 kids in the water (one who looked like she was about 8 yrs old) and 2 kids going down the slide. in reality it was more like a wading pool for infants that barely fit ONE kid. how disappointing! we ended up returning that one and in the same morning, i came back with pool #3

- this pool was PERFECT. large, square in shape, with plenty of room for ALL of us to fit in. after a fun afternoon in the pool, russ tried to drain it and found that there there was no plug. WHAT?! are you kidding me! so after he spent over an hour letting the air out, pushing the walls down, then lifting up the side to get all the water out, we determined that pool #3 was going back to the store too.

- we ordered pool #5 online and splurged a little for the sake of not wanting to be disappointed this time around. while waiting for pool #5, we decided that maybe we should try to get a smaller pool for THIS weekend and just return pool #5 when it arrived (since it was rather pricey). i had russ pick up a pool that i knew would work since we had it before. he set up pool #4 yesterday and we realized that once again, this pool did NOT have a plug to drain the water. it was the exact same pool we had before which HAD a drain plug! apparently they don't put those in pools anymore???? we will probably return pool #4 as well...

- in the mean time, we anticipate the arrival of pool #5...

natalie shooting her brother

enjoying a popsicle