A fabulous Fourth!

The 4th of July is always a big deal at our house, at least for my bigger boys, as it is the one day out of the year when they can blow things up....legally. It's also highly anticipated by the biggest of the bunch...Dad. They make the annual trek to the fireworks stand and load up. If I told you a $$$ amount spent, you might faint, so let's just say that they put on a good show! We started off the evening with the traditional BBQ-is there any other way to do it on the 4th? Hubby made brisket, pulled pork sandwiches, and hot dogs. We also had all the fixings to go along with it-chips, beans, corn, watermelon, and the most important part of the meal-dessert! My mom got me this great cupcake holder for my birthday last week, since she knows I love to bake. I was looking forward to using it, and this was the perfect opportunity! It holds 35 cupcakes, so I was ready for a crowd. I baked up the red and white cupcakes, in the nifty 4th of July cupcake holders and topped each with icing, red, white and blue sprinkles, and a small star shaped sugar cookie. Fun and yummy! Thanks Mom for the awesome gift! Doesn't she know me too well?

This is pure happiness when you're 3!

After all the eating, it was time to get the show on the road. The boys took over and started lighting!

They had rockets, firecrackers, spinning things, sparkly ones...pretty much every kind you could imagine! All the boys and their friends participated and had a great time-we enjoyed the show, too-alomost an hour long! I watched about a third of it and then went inside to comfort the scared little ones. Poor things-those fireworks are loud! The only downside to all this fun? The cleanup the next morning-my boys were kept very busy most of the morning!