Happy Birthday, America!

My title is compliments of Gavin since all day yesterday, he was walking around singing Happy Birthday! I would like to think he knew it was America's birthday, but something tells me he just learned it from the Sprouts channel on our satellite... Darn! (And it continued through today... He kept turning to me and saying "Happy Birthday, Mom!!!" So seriously, where are my presents?!) But anyway, for those of you who have read Lindsay's blog already (since she was much more on the ball than me), I'm sure you can tell we had a great 4th of July! Since she basically covered everything we did, I thought I should cover the little things she didn't... Hopefully she didn't leave them out for a reason!

Well, the morning was supposed to start with the traditional McDonald's breakfast at 8:00. But of course, as Swenson luck would have it, both boys were up the middle of the night and when it came time to get up (bright and early at 5:30 a.m.), I apparently turned my alarm off in my sleep. Thank heavens one of those insanely heavy, loud trains came by, shaking my bed and all, and woke me right out of bed at 6:50!!! (Ha ha, I think that's the only time I've ever been thankful for one of those huge trains rolling by.) So, by the time everybody was bathed/showered and ready to go, we obviously missed the McDonald's breakfast... And I was really looking forward to that Egg McMuffin! :(

Fortunately though, we still got down to the Provo Parade in good time, which of course was the highlight for Gavin. He is still talking about the "Shreak Fiona" float that went by. And as Lindsay said, I still can't believe some people gave up their seats to us! It was so nice to actually be able to sit down... well, then stand up, then sit down, then stand up, then sit down... :) You know how it goes whenever a flag comes by or our armed forces come by. In fact, I actually leaned over to my mom at one point and said, "Don't you think they're really overdoing it with the flags this year? I'm so sick of standing up!" And she just gave me a surprised look and said, "Well it is Independence Day!" Ha ha... What a horrible person I am. And of course, it wouldn't be the Provo Parade without my Dad vocally booing Chris Cannon as usual. Fortunately, he has toned down the volume since I went last!

Once we got back to my parent's, of course the boys went swimming (and when I say boys, I mean ALL the boys... my dad included!). They had a really good time, though Gavin's face in this picture doesn't seem to show that! But he really did... Once that was all said and done and the little boys were exhausted, the big boys (i.e. Mike and Greg) were itching to go do something so we let them go go-carting. And of course, they had to go TV shopping while they were out (stop trying to get my husband to spend money we don't have, Mike! :) ) While the boys were gone, my mom, Linz, and I got into an interesting conversation about what we don't like about ourselves, how we wish we could take fat from certain areas of our body and put it into our chests, and how you're supposed to smile with your teeth not touching in pictures! Ha ha, it was interesting... but hilarious.

Once the boys were back, we decided to go shopping. Lindsay needed to get some hair stuff and that was about all we were planning on shopping for... or so we thought. In the end, Linz got a fabulous deal on her hair stuff and ended up spending a lot less money than she was expecting, and I ended up buying $90 worth of clothes... $90 more than I was planning on spending! ;) Oh well, at least I will look cute on our cruise! (Which honestly may be spent in the room the entire time... and NO, not for the reason you may be thinking! I am about 3 years behind on my sleep right now and I am ready to catch up!!!)

After shopping, we headed back to my parents for a barbeque, where Gavin was dipping everything he could find into his chip dip. I never knew strawberries and chip dip went together, but according to him, they do! Yuck! Then, of course, it was time for the grand fireworks show. And it was grand, let me tell ya. Our $30 box of fireworks from Walmart was gone in about 5 minutes, and by that point, Connor was already bored with them and Gavin was in the house crying because he hated them! In fact, I tried to get Gavin to watch them from the house with me but that just made him more upset. (I was honestly shocked because we were watching some fireworks the other night on the news and he thought they were the greatest things ever.) In the end though, he was willing to watch the Stadium of Fire fireworks from my parents' second floor and he actually really liked them! I finally figured out the problem he was having earlier when he kept saying, "Fireworks cool! Fireworks far away!" :)

Our 4th of July ended at about 2:00 this morning when we finally got to bed! We got home at 12:30, then dealt with some major tantrums from both children! Seriously, what did they have to complain about? They didn't have that bad of a day, come on! But really, we had a great time (and YES Kristin, we missed you!) and we hope you guys all had a good 4th too. Until next time! -Ash