Busy 4th of July weekend

We went to Bainbridge Island on 4th of July, for our annual gathering and parade.
They have a small town parade, which is so much fun. The kids collected lots of candy. We got more candy than on Halloween!
I gave Jon and Jacob some party poppers and snap it's and they were used up before night came.
While we waited in line for the ferry, we killed time by taking camera phone pictures.


4th of July funny feet.

We caught the fireworks @ GasWorks up at Wallingford park, which is a pretty good viewing site w/o all the crowds. Lola & Popoe even walked around the lake over to the park to watch with us. I was happy, that they finally joined us, after about 3 years of invites and fireworks on TV. Jonny did a really RAD rave dance with his glow sticks for us, after the fireworks finished. I can't decide which was my favorite of the 2 shows we watched.

On Saturday, we did little gym as usual, then headed out to a birthday party for a 3 year old freind. She had a Candy/Princess theme. I'm so not schooled in shopping for little girl toys. I didn't like anything @ Target toy aisles. They have a whole aisle dedicated to BRATS. Yuck. So we made a special stop @ Top Ten Toys. I found some very cute things, while Philip and the boyz explored. Philip said that we're never shopping @ Target for toys again...
Anyway, the birthday party was fun, but they had rented a party bouncer and after 1/2 hour of play it poured down rain for the rest of the day. It was sad. Instead the kids stayed in doors and ate candy and bounced on the walls.

Sunday!
EJ and Nicky, some crazy, powerful 15 year olds came up from Spanaway to be our backyard jungle work crew. Philip, and the big boys did an awesome job clearing and bagging. I was working on breaking down the wood pile, that never seemed to get smaller because they kept adding to it.
Here is the progress that we made. I'm so pleased.


Backyard jungle cleared


19 yard waste containers total...and a bunch of compose piles all around the yard...and a huge pile of wood that still needs to be broken down...I need to get over my fear of the chain saw...


Monster bush tamed.
This bush used to take up 1/4 of the yard...Dioji used to hide inside there, trying to catch squirrels (or whatever lived in there...rats? birds?)
I went at it with the loppers, a saw and pruning clippers. The goal was to hack at it until it was more manageable, but not distroy it. (it has some pretty red flowers and is really a nice plant) You can see the carnage all around. At least I can get in there at the base and thin it out now.

Yay for Nicky and EJ!!! We couldn't have done it without them. They went inside to get cleaned up before returning home and by the time I came in all 3(including Philip) were asleep in the living room. We sure worked them to the bone...

Next up...
Rototiller, new seed.
Junk, Rotten Deck, hot Tub removal
Wall in front
New Flower beds.
Playstructure!!!

August, here we come.