Celebrating Independence Day~ Fun & Fireworks!

Growing up, July 4th was one of my favorite holidays.  We did the same thing almost every year...First, there was a parade the whole town turned out to see. Then, we would head to a cookout lunch with grandparents, cousins, aunts, and uncles and finish the day with a festival and fireworks. I loved it!

Now, I live about 800 miles from my hometown and we are in the process of making our own traditions. Here is what we did this year...we'll see what sticks and what doesn't!

Learning Stuff-- Assuming we continue with our current curriculum, our girls will study American History around first grade.  Honestly, I can't wait! I love history anyway, but i especially love the history of our founding fathers.  It will be so much fun!  In the meantime, I found a little mini-unit that I worked on with the girls at 2 Teaching Mommies.  It was perfect for Susannah's level.  Mikayla enjoyed the activities too, even though they were a little easy for her. Their favorite thing was the Roll and Graph fireworks. We turned it into a game to see who could roll 10 of the same picture first (Mikayla won, finally).



Susie is sorting her fireworks by size.

 We also checked out some books at the library with a Revolutionary War/ Independence Day theme.  One of the ones we picked was Independent Dames by Laurie Halse Anderson.  It was fascinating to me, but a little over the girls' heads. It tells of the many ways women helped during the Revolutionary War and is packed full of information.

Food-- I wasn't quite up to doing July 4th crafts this year, but we did celebrate with a festive red, white, and blue snack. We used strawberries, marshmallows, and blueberries and placed them on skewers.  It was yummy!  Susie didn't bother with the skewer-- she just found it easier to pick what she wanted from the bowl!  Mikayla found the skewer idea fun and made several! I wish I could link back to the person I got the idea from, but I can't find it now. Bummer.





Fireworks!  We debated about going to fireworks this year. Jeff was working and I was likely going to be trying to keep track of both girls by myself in crazy crowds and traffic.  Thankfully, a friend gave us a great idea of where to go... a local school about a mile from where the fireworks were launched. It was perfect on many levels. First, Jeff's parents came with us-- Granny and Pop-Pop make everything better!  Also, Lori and her family used the same idea she gave us, so my kids LOVED passing time with friends!  Evan and I found out that a football is much harder to catch at dusk and the rest of the kids played some serious "Duck, duck, goose" or "Flynn, Flynn, Maximus" (a game we played at the girls' Tangled party) before the fireworks started. We had to move because of an enormous tree that was blocking our view, but it was otherwise a great spot to watch the light show.



Susie and Granny- I promise that Susie is smiling!



Life is more fun with friends to play with! The little guy in
front is Matthew- July 4th is his birthday! 
In the back row, there is Rachel, Juliet, Mikayla, and Evan.
 Susie was off to the side somewhere.
 

All in all, we had a great celebration-- what about you?