4th of July

Truly - 4th of July is one of my favorite weekends of the year - and this weekend (although it was kind of a blur) was no different.

Our weekend started on Friday morning with a visit from our LA besties Beth and Grady. Leo and Grady were born just two weeks apart and it has been so much fun watching them get big together. 

They had such a blast playing together too, it broke my heart that our visits are so infrequent now, but I think we may get them back to Illinois in the next few years. 

Friday night Joel was the best man in his best friend's wedding. 

It was such a fun reunion with all of Joel's best friends. They have all been thick as thieves since high school, and they're just the best people to be around. 

 

I played DD because I knew I needed to pace myself for the entire weekend so after a drive through stop at Wendys (which I think it's been 10 years since we've done that), we were home before 1am and ready to hit the ground running on Saturday.

Saturday morning we visited with my cousins who stayed with us, (also from LA). It was so much fun for my moms brothers and sisters to have all of their grandbabies together....and the entire day, Leo was spoiled with love. He has a lot of local 2nd cousins that just adore him to pieces.

 

 

Saturday was my cousin Gia's graduation party. They had a bounce house for all of the kids and I'm pretty sure Leo spent at least 3 hours in there. The kid was so sweaty and is still catching up on sleep from this weekend! 

 

 

And my grandmother, with all of her GREAT grandbabies.

 

Sunday morning we went over to Joel's parents to visit with Joel's brother Andrew's family who came in for the weekend from San Diego. We had a great breakfast and let the kids play for a few hours before Crystal Lake's parade.

The parade was so much with Leo. He was literally shaking in excitement from all of the firetrucks, candy, and songs, and my sisters were happy to keep a close on eye on him and share in his joy.

   

 

After nap, we walked down to the fest that happens every year over the 4th of July weekend for dinner and Leo's first ride.

 

 

And then....because, we hadn't done enough in one day, we had to gear up for fireworks! We made the call to keep Leo awake this year, and I'm so glad we did. He absolutely loved them (when he wearing sunglasses!)  

 

 

By the time we got home, it was every bit of 10:30/11pm, but Leo fell asleep pretty quickly and slept in until almost 9:30am the next morning and really didn't have any lasting impact on sleep either.

And then finally, to cap off the whirlwind weekend, we had all of Joel's family over for a BBQ on Monday. We kept it really easy and just enjoyed the time together since they're trip to Illinois was pretty short.