Gracie's Birthday Party!

Since Gracie's birthday is July 1st, it's hard to plan her party so close to the holiday. So we had it last weekend at our pool. She was so excited and stated how this was "the best day ever!" 

I put together little gift bags with a mermaid necklace and mermaid shrink dinks inside.  The theme was mermaids. 

 

The kids got to swim for 4 hours!  Presley's friend Tyler came because his sister Allison was there.

 

The girls had so much fun swimming.

 

Gracie got goofy with Emma and Evelyn.

 

 

The boys had to take a break and eat some goldfish.

 

The girls were having fun showing off their gymnastic skills in the pool.

 

Evie had fun too!

 

 

In fact, Piper came too because Meryn was at the party.  

 

After some pizza, most of the girls ended up taking a break from swimming and decided to play in the sand.

 

Amy made these adorable dolphin cookies.

 

And these super cute mermaid cookies!  They were quite the hit!

 

Grandma had the idea of making ice cream sundaes so first we sang to Gracie.

 

Then we took a group pic.

 

And then we had to do a silly pic too.

 

Then the ice cream madness started.  The girls had a blast putting all kinds of toppings on their ice cream. From chocolate chips, to M&M's, to cookie dough, to sprinkles, it was yummy!

 

After ice cream, the girls had a little bit of time left to swim so they did.

 

And play in the sand one more time.

 

It was a fun party and I think everyone had a great time!  As soon as we got home though, Gracie couldn't wait to open her presents. 

 

I'm glad she had a such a great day!  She is so lucky to have so many wonderful friends!

The 4th of July!

The weather here has been kind of cool and cloudy. So instead of heading to the pool like we had planned, we went to the Phillps Park Zoo!  Grandma and Grandpa came with us and Amy too. They had never been here.

 

It's a tiny zoo but it is cute and it's free.  They have eagles.

 

And sea otters.

 

And turkeys.

 

And lots of pretty flowers.

They have a neat reptile house with this huge snake in it.

 



 

And two alligators. 

 

And lots of turtles.

 

We walked to the park and played around a little bit.

We sat on the cannons.

Grandpa even got in on the playground fun!

 



 

We found a zipline too!

Then we went in the mastodon museum and looked at the fossils and bones.

 

And we checked out the gardens.

 

After that, we went to the Ogle house to have some more 4th fun!  We set off smoke bombs.

 

And did lots of Pop-It's!

 

Gracie drew this on the driveway!

 

We made S'mores and Colton had fun eating marshmallows. 

 

Then while the neighborhood set off lots of fireworks, we had fun doing all kinds of sparklers. 

 

God Bless America!