Fabulous Family Filled Fourth!

Fourth of July has long been on my top 5 list of holidays. It is slowly inching higher, as I watch the excitement of the fourth through the eyes of my boys, and my nieces and nephew! Huett, Sam and Ava were more excited about this celebration than I have seen them since, oh, I don't know, Christmas morning?!?

Last week, the little fireworks stand on the highway put up one of those blow-up tube men that rises and falls, and ever since seeing that thing on the way to preschool, my boys have been asking about shooting fireworks.

So, shoot fireworks, we did...well, not us, exactly.

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In high school, I had the pleasure of meeting two young men, Kenneth Yarbrough and John Allen. They are members of a big, fun family full of a bunch of boys (and a few girls). This family has produced some of the nicest, most caring people I have known, and while we've grown up, and apart, whenever I run into John and Kenneth, its like we're back in 2001. John and Kenneth are cousins. I think between the two of their families there are five boys and two girls. I hope that when mine and Trisha and Chad's kids grow up (4 boys and 3 girls) that they'll have the relationship this set of cousins has. I can remember meeting up to ride four-wheelers in the snow with these guys and it was always a blast. I can also remember cheering them on as they rode their bicycle off a homemade ramp into their family pond (so much fun). I always did get along better with boys than girls.

Anyway, you just don't meet an entire family of well-adjusted, responsible kids(that are now adults) very often!

I say all of this to tell you that while we had intentions of going to the city to watch fireworks at the Vulcan, we were just too tired to make that trip so late at night. Especially since I had to work the next day. That's when Kenneth and John popped back into my head. I remember going to watch their fireworks in high school!

So, I called Kenneth and he welcomed us to come, so, of course, we did!

This was the view from where we sat! All the boys from the Yarbrough/Allen family were out setting up the fireworks, as best I could tell. They had tons, guys, seriously! It had grown exponentionally since I was there 10 or so years ago! Impressive, to say the least!


Excitement was mounting at a pretty rapid pace!



My parents, and even my Nana made the trip (which is only like five minutes from our houses)
Isn't Charlie getting to be such a big boy?!? He was ten months old, today! He kind of looks like a toddler in this picture. I think it's the shoes.


Trisha's silly little family was there, and once again, excitement was at a maximum!




We stopped by a fireworks stand on our way there and let the kids pick out their own special one. They all, of course, picked out rockets. On a whole other subject, is Sam not going to be a lady killer?? The girls just won't stand a chance...and neither will I
:-l






These rockets were a prized possession throughout the night.

My men...

Disclaimer:

In every picture where Charlie was looking, Mikey looks drugged up, so I thought you'd all prefer to see the back of Charlie's head as opposed to Mikey looking high.

There were lots of locals there, including another old friend from high school, and her baby girl Lily (is that flaming red hair not to die for?!?) .

Yet another dear friend from high school, Jason, and his son Jase were there. His wife is a fellow blogger (one of the few in my area) and you can visit her blog here.

Have I mentioned that Charlie is quite a daddy's boy?

It wasn't long until the fireworks extravaganza began!

Pretty soon, all eyes were on the skies. This is Sam and his sure to be best friend Wilson, whose parents, Bethany and Nathan are also near and dear to our hearts! I'm telling you it was like a reunion in our town. Anyone who was anybody was there, am I right? And I was just off in my own little corner of approximately 50 people. I bet there were atleast 200 people there, if not more.

This was the view to my right!

I still haven't mastered the art of taking great firework photos. Seeing as I only get to practice once, maybe twice every 365 days, that is understandable!

Even little Charlie was mesmerized by all the colors, sights, and sounds!
once again, Mikey looks high...what's with this guy?

This was the view to my left, and people went down the line just like this as far as the fence went.
People sat like this the entire time, in silence, with the occasional whistle or cheers and claps from the crowd!

The fireworks probably lasted for fifteen minutes or so, and were pretty impressive! You'd never have known this was just a family thing that has grown as the years have passed. If I didn't know any better, I'd have sworn Crazy Bill himself was at the reins.

Everybody was watching in awe, even little Arch!

Sam and Huett used to be so scared of fireworks. The loud sounds more than anything, but not anymore! He was drinking it in!

Charlie, on the other hand, was not phased in the least, while he celebrated his first fourth!

I think it is due to the fact that he is subjected to noises as loud as fireworks on a daily basis, while interacting with his big brothers.

This was, by far, the best shot I got all night!

The finale was really impressive, and they had this shower of different colored sparks that went up probably fifty feet in the air, and I had seen those before, but never on such a grand scale! It was an impressive way to end the show!

Thanks Yarbrough/Allen family for the show!! I think I speak for everyone there when I say it was a blast and we will be back next year (and probably every year after that)!!

Good luck gettin' rid of us!

Well Done!

After that, we headed to another friends house to shoot our own personal stash of fireworks.

We had everything from the standard bottle rockets and sparklers to things like Saturn Missiles, and Bumblebees

None quite as impressive as what we'd already seen, but for these kids, the sparklers were excitement enough!

I don't know why these pictures are sideways, but you get the drift!!

These pictures turned out really cool!

Huett is demanding to have fireworks at his birthday party this weekend, and I told him I think we can make that happen!

The weather was perfect and it could not have turned out to be a better night!

It was, however, a late night. It was around 11:30 before we made it home!

Poor little Charlie was unprepared for that!!

He was such a trooper, but as midnight approached, he said he'd had enough!

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This is a big week for the Hill family. My brother turns 29 Wednesday,

Huett Michael turns five on Thursday!!

Charlie is getting tubes put in his precious little baby ears early Friday morning, and Huett's camping extravangza fifth birthday bash is Friday night!

So, pray for a good day on Friday for our entire family!!

I think Charlie's going to be a new little boy once we get this issue corrected!! Yay for that

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I will be posting soon with some very exciting house related news in the near future!

Just a few more hoops to jump through on the buying and selling end so cross your fingers for us! Sometimes things just fall into place and work out, you know?!? And that's what we're praying will continue to happen!!

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Happy fourth everybody!!