4th of July

We had a great Independence Day and need to share some pictures...
Ajo has a parade, if you can call it that (about 6 blocks, 10 entries and 20 minutes), but we did go see it since we could walk about 30 feet from our house and have first row seats. Here are the kids with our neighbor Larry.

First up, the flag and honor guard...I thought it was awesome because it consisted of National Park Service, Border Patrol, Pima County Sheriff, and BLM. The one holding the American flag is the Chief Ranger at the monument where Cody works.

Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument fire engine...woohoo, go Park Service!!! (side note: my awesome park ranger husband would have been in the fire truck, but he had to work, darn it)

And another fire engine, this one from Ajo Fire Dept.

And, wait, ANOTHER one from Ajo Fire Dept.

And that pretty much did it for the parade, not kidding...
Annalyn looked at me and said, "What? Thats it?!?! Where's the rest of it?" I gave her fair warning this parade was NOT like the one in Spanish Fork on Pioneer Day, but disappointment still happened.
After the parade we headed down the main part of town where they had booths and games for the kids. My favorite was this one...
Toilet Paper Toss!!! (sigh, only in Ajo)


Then we stopped by the face painting booth, and Jake's only lasted until we got home, by then he had unknowingly rubbed it off.

So by this time its about 10 am, 100 degrees and 65% humidity because of all the wonderful rain we had the night before, so we head home and did a little patriotic painting...

Then after lunch, we're bored waiting for dad to get home so we make cupcakes, can't go wrong with that! Thank you Martha Stewart for the decorating idea.

It was all I could do to keep Jake from eating all the raspberries before they were used on the cupcakes.

And of course, it was all I could do to keep Anna from eating all of the marshmellows before they were used on the cupcakes.

Finished product, not too bad with two kids who couldn't keep their fingers in control.

Love these kiddos, they made it fun today even though we couldn't spend it with our families in Utah, but it was fun to be somewhere new.

Happy 4th everyone! Hope it was great for you!