Fourth of July Follies

My favorite holiday is Independence Day. By far my favorite holiday. Most people miss their families when they are away at Christmas. Not me. During the Fourth of July is when I get weepy. All day long I think about what the family is probably doing right now. This year I didn't want it to be like that. I decided to pull off a week of Independence Day fun to distract me and keep me from wishing I was there. It was a great success. We had a blast. Every day that week we did something themed around the Fourth.

We had many Fourth of July themed meals and snacks. 

Those pinwheel cookies were a challenge to make, but so rewarding when they came out.

For Family Home Evening Evee was in charge of the snack, so she dipped and decorated those strawberries.

And that magical striped drink was pretty cool. Just make sure you fill the cup with ice before pouring. 

We lit off fireworks with our neighbors. The little neighbor boy, Adam, kept shouting, "Do it again!" after each one. Liam ran in the house and hid once the bigger ones came out.

We pulled together a last minute Fourth of July camping trip. Everywhere to camp was booked up, so we just left in hopes of something working out. Sure enough, every time we decide to throw caution to the wind and go, something works out. And it tends to be more of an adventure than if we had been able to do it the regular old dependable way.
We are doing Park Quest again this year. Maryland offers a certain number of families access to state parks to be able to do quests at each one. Twelve of the twenty-four quests must be completed by Labor Day to go to the big family picnic/activity at the end of summer. So our Park Quest passport brought us to yet another state park. On the fourth we went to Rocky Gap State Park. Will took the kids camping there last summer, but it was my first time. I loved it. With our pass we were able to rent two canoes for free (only three people can go in a canoe). Liam sure didn't like it, but the rest of us had fun. The wind was so strong, and because Will and I each had only small children in the canoes with us, we both weighed down the back of the canoes making the wind push up under the front of the canoes. We discovered that by canoeing backwards when the winds came we were able to go against the wind without any problem because the back end sunk into the water due to our large hineys. I'm sure we looked pretty weird out there rowing backwards, but hey, if it works...

 On Lake Habeeb. You gotta say that name out loud. Too fun, right?

After canoeing we swam at the beach and played on the playground. We searched around a few places, and finally found some super cheap camping at Paw Paw Tunnel, which is a mile long tunnel on the C&O Canal Trail. So of course we had to hike to the other end of the tunnel, too. Cool thing was some random drunk guys came and shot off big ol' fireworks near where we were camping. Maybe not legal or so safe, but we dragged our sleeping bags over and watched. Belle said that was her favorite part of the trip.

Since Belle and Will's backpacking trip, when we go camping they sleep in their hammocks and the younger two and I sleep in our smaller tent.

The next day we hit up another quest at the Washington Monument.

This monument is right off the Appalachian Trail where Will and Tommy hiked for a few days, so we hiked along some of the trail just to check out a bit of what they had hiked.

After the Monument we went to South Mountain Creamery where you can watch (and smell) the cows while you eat delicious ice cream.

Upon seeing the cows Liam plugged his nose and said, "Ew, gross." Even later when he saw this picture of the cows all he said was, "Poop." 

Then we watched fireworks that night at the Antietam National Battlefield. It was incredible, I tell ya. First they had a concert by the Maryland Symphony, which was quite marvelous. Immediately following were the fireworks. It was by far the longest firework show I had ever witnessed. The finale was so intense I said to Will while it was going, "I can't handle the stimulus overload!" All the while they were blasting off cannons. It was amazing. Definitely worth a repeat.

We toured pretty much all of Maryland in those two days. We were all over the place, but it was so fun. It ended up being one of my happiest Independence Days ever.

Loads of Camping

We have been camping so much lately that I have not had a chance to blog...or do much of anything else. Literally I get a couple loads of laundry done and we pack them up to go again. Luckily camping is at the top of my favorites list. Will has been out of work for a bit while waiting for his license to come in (Which it did yesterday. Yay! Will is officially a therapist! Doesn't feel real though, yet.), so we have decided to take that open time and play hard. It has been lovely. I feel happy and blessed. Today I am prepping for another camping trip tomorrow.

Here's from some of our latest adventures:

We have been on many day hikes in addition to these camping trips. I tell you what - party on!

Just wondering when all this is going to catch up to us....