Celebrating the Fourth - Skousen Style

 So we begin with a dessert and end with a dessert because that's just how we roll around here. On Tuesday, I had Sam help me make these patriotic treats in prep for the holiday. He had a ton of fun helping me. I love finding an excuse to go a little above and beyond the normal to try something fun like this.

 Then Tuesday night I went to YW where we did patriotic pedicures. Fun, huh? Yeah, well, one thing I am quickly finding being a leader is that it is not always quite as fun for the leaders as it is for the girls. I spend an hour and a half painting red, white, blue, stripes, stars, etc. And ended up without anything on my nails. Robert went to stake out our spot for the IF fireworks and my sister and her family were on their way to our house, so I started to paint my own nails and ended up spending way too much time on them. But it was kind of fun to do something unique, too. I have to admit I still want to try glitter nails, but maybe soon.

 Here is the bow-to-stern picture requested after posting about our first fishing adventure on our $150 fishing boat. Now we have new stories to add! Thanks to a wonderful family friend who was willing to leave her family for the morning/afternoon and come watch the babies (Amy and Thomas) so that we could take this baby out to float the North Fork of the Snake River! It was awesome, let me tell you!!

 We started our trip off with losing half of one of the minnow traps (of course half of the new one, not from the crappy one we've "found"). Then we set off. The fishing was AMAZING!! Everyone had at least one catch for the day, my little sister April catching the monster brown trout (which she is pointing out for you in the above photo). The river was a little sketchy in places, but that is where a flat-bottomed boat really comes in handy :) After making it over the sketchy parts with Robert trying to take John's head off once and breaking the top off my fishing pole and losing another, we hit a spot where we just weren't moving. Crap. So we spent the last two hours of the trip trading off rowing and all getting roasted (me especially). We finally made it to the car at the end of the run and headed home to clean the fish and start prepping for the rest of the night's activities. (Side note: we have decided that we don't want to float the river again until we have a motor on the boat for that end part)

 We had an all-out cook out for dinner with my sister's family and some family friends. It was great food and great company! I decided to make this patriotic flag cake again in honor of the holiday (I had made it when we were at another sister's house two years ago for a family reunion)

 Pictures of the cut into the cake. Super fun and fabulously delicious, especially with homemade ice cream to go along with it!

After dinner and dessert we headed to our staked out spot in Idaho Falls for the famous fireworks show. Our family friends are from Arizona and have never seen these fireworks, so we were excited to see if they would be impressed or not. Robert told me they were quite amazed. I, unfortunately, was unable to stick around and see their reaction because Amy (who was so overly tired from having only one very short nap all day) was extremely scared by the fireworks and wouldn't calm down until I took her back to the car and buckled her in her carseat with me singing to her to muffle the sounds of the fireworks. She was intrigued by the colors, but I think the noise was too much for her. I was able to watch out the back window of the car, though. The Idaho Falls fireworks are simply amazing. If you ever get a chance to come see them, they are worth it, truly! Even if it does take an hour to get out, it is worth it for the 30 minutes of continuous, huge, amazing, beautiful fireworks! Hope your fourth was enjoyable and now I am going to go finish enjoying my sister and her family while they are still here!