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In our house, the 4th of July just wouldn’t be complete without a trip to the pool. We love our neighborhood pool. Great people, beautiful water, fun and sunshine.

The festivities start with a parade around the neighborhood with kids on bikes, or scooters, or walking…. whatever they want, leading back to the pool. Then the grills are fired up and Moms from all over the neighborhood provide sides and drinks. Kids and parents will graze on food all afternoon.

At around 1:00 the games began. We had noodle racing in all the age groups. But, personally, I think the adult race was the absolute funniest thing I saw all day. You sat on the noodle like a horse and had to breast stroke to the far wall. Then your spouse would head off to finish at the opposite wall. **psssst ~ some of the adults got disqualified for doing a freestyle stroke, which was CLEARLY against the rules** GB got third place in his age group. He’s on the lime-green noodle.

The kids learned from the adults disqualifications and played by the rules. So fun! Then we had coin tossing in the shallow end. Then we had “white water rafting.” This looked so much like a homeschool craft that it cracked me up. It was two two-liter bottles taped together with a mast glued to the center and then balloons used as flags on top. You were supposed to move your raft along the water to the other end of the pool without using hands. After trial and error, it was determined that heads worked better than trying to push the water behind the raft. Especially if you could get the raft between your head and shoulder and swim without agitating the water.

Next they had the three-legged water race. The kids had a blast with this one and it allowed them to team up with buddies. It IS helpful, however, if your partner goes in the right direction during the race. I’m not sure what GB’s partner was thinking during this race.

A day at the pool just isn’t complete without a few tosses from your Dad, who is super strong, and can really make a kid fly!

I thought this was a sweet, bonding moment between father and son. **Altogether now…. Awwwwwww!**

These are the kind of tosses where he really gets some air, but I couldn’t click the shutter fast enough to get the picture quite right.

Our family tradition involves going to a local pizza place after a day at the pool. We enjoy a leisurely dinner and then head off to the Home Depot parking lot to catch the city fireworks display. This year they moved the launch location just a tad, but it impaired our view quite a bit. Everyone in the parking lot was having a blast, though, throwing frisbees, and footballs, and of course, chatting.

My BIL’s city allows fireworks that don’t shoot off into the air, fountains and smoke bombs, that kind of thing. In Chesterfield, you can’t buy or use any fireworks. So after the big fireworks display, we head off to his house and the men and boys put on their own show. I am not exaggerating when I speculate that between all branches of the family, at least $300.00 was spent on fireworks. You should have seen it. GB was happy with his sparklers and he even got to bring fountains to his cousins, and uncles, and his Daddy to shoot off. He also got to use the hose and wet the fireworks down after they had been shot off. He enjoyed his job of keeping everyone safe.

Yesterday pooped me out, so today I’ll try to get some rest. Who knew that having a fun time could tire a Mom out so much. I’ll bet GB will be just raring to go!

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