Let Freedom Ring!

I LOVE celebrations in small towns. Something so friendly and safe and all together wonderful about community. We participated in the 4th in a BIG way. Weeks leading up to the event in preparation, planning meetings and a little pressure there at the end. Here is Grandma with baby Darlin' after the chaos ended and we were chillin' at a barbecue with great friends. What a perfect way to end the day.
Brig is a little stinker and gets too too too much attention for those dimples. Here he's flashing me a smile after throwing a whomping fit in the park. One smart cookie.
Ayvri didn't get the idea to quit her fit and threw it for a long LONG time. She is rarely like this and I blame it on not enough sleep, too much sugar and excitement, or maybe her pigtails were just too tight. Either way it was remedied by a nice long nap.
The little dears in the parade line-up. It's rare that the girls show this much affection for their brother so I thought I'd capture the love while it lasted. He doesn't seem to mind.

Someone may have gotten up a little too early this morning. Thank heavens he didn't realize he was tired with all the excitement. If only little Darlin' would have left her sparkly headband on, she'd have looked more like a girl, but she did love eating the flags.

We have been running this promotion to raise money for the families of the 222. Can't imagine sending my husband off to fight a war right now and yet so many families are. Makes me very thankful.
Thanks so much to Seth & Mel for being AMAZING at all our Vinyl requests. They are great at what they do and made us look good. Also to the guy who loaned us the Gator. He's great, but I'm not supposed to tell people :)
Here's our whole group. We had so much help it was awesome! Grandma Lu was even brave enough to ride in her very first parade ever. She was fantastic and kept the kids in line. Thanks everyone for giving up your holiday to spend it walking/running down a parade route.
Here's the mini-fleet. They really looked so adorable in their little bandanas and shirts, tutus and bows. How cool is it that we have this many cousins our age running around the neighborhood? (missing from this picture is Abel Wayne, he missed the primping hour).