The holiday weekend activities~ July 3rd. and 4th.

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We actually had no set plans for a family get-together- with most of the family working and/or, away. What I mean is we had no plans for the traditional cookouts and fire works or parade watching- etc- (the things we think of for this holiday) 

Charles and I probably would end up going out  for the dinner meal on the 4th, and maybe both days. (which would have been just fine!)

...But...as it turned out our weekend was fuller than we had planned or expected.

Saturday my sister and brother-in-law invited  Charles and me over for a cook-out meal.  It was just the 4 of us and we had lots of time for chit-chat! We all enjoyed it...well, I hope they did and I know both C. and I did!

  LOL- Something appealing about NOT being the one fixing the meal- though I DID bring the ice cream!  ;)  And, oh, what a good meal it was! Everything was delicious!

Here is a picture of my sister, Joy, as we were about to have dinner; and a couple of us together.

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Yesterday we were invited to our friends place right here in our neighborhood, to a cook-out- July 4th celebration!

These folks are Ted and Sandy (Ted is the guy who has done so much work for us in the past year...home repairs/improvements- etc!) We've been very impressed with his work and there always seems to be another project that we come up with!  :)

 

Anyway, they recently finished their home that Ted designed and built himself- a beautiful log home , finished inside with a lot of old wood ; floors- walls- ceiling...It's fantastic! Well, of course I didn't want to get pictures to spread over the Internet  of the inside of their home-but I just love the craftsmanship that went into the building and also the way Sandy has decorated it! 

It was a rainy day for celebrating the 4th here, but it worked out ok-since their house is built with a wrap-around porch on 3 sides.

They had some excellent grilled food ready to serve very soon after we got there-hamburgers, grilled sausages and hot dogs- peppers and onions-many covered side dishes too.

With the weather being rainy and messy -even with the porches-people were in the house a lot- but they managed to play the games Sandy had planned. Everyone looked to be having a great time! C. and I  stayed on the sidelines for the games, though.

My girls-Tina, Alli and Joy( D-I-L)- were there but not during the games. They would have liked that -but they had gone to take Brian to a friend's house then they went by home to pick up Alli's pup -'Cooper.'  When they came back with 'Coop'  he was a big hit with a couple of little girls there!  :)

K- A few pics here...The wrestling champ is Rick. He's Ted's brother and has helped him with some of the projects done for us. 

 The small lake is on their property and some folks had fun catching catfish!  :)  

Some other random shots of the party.

  

They have a big open space in back-2 or more acres- where they had a fireworks display set up!

Just after nightfall they set off the fireworks. It wasn't a hard rain at that point so the fireworks went off with a 'bang' ... did not 'fizzle out' as I expected might happen with the rain.

 It was fun to watch as we sat on the back porch!

I didn't get good pics of the fireworks - but Oh, well-we still enjoyed  it!

Hope you all had a good weekend of celebrating!

Junie