4th of July fun!

We started off the holiday fun on Monday at Huck Finn/Pollyanna days at the Original Mine Yard. They didn't dress up, but they had a lot of fun in the bouncy house, playing croquet, throwing water balloons, and watching the sack races. Their favorite part was cooling off in the hose with the Peck kids.

Then we ate lunch at DQ and swung by the wading pool since we were uptown. Ave is doing a spectacular dance with her "long hair" here!

Lando is back! Erica and Landon came in on the 2nd - it was so nice to see them. Carter and Landon wore matching shirts of course (Erica and I always do that!)

Landon loves fireworks this year (which is a huge change). Erica helped them set off some fun daytime ones in the front yard.

Even Teague tried a confetti one!

We went up to the Bolten house again for the 3rd. Mom's friend Judy has a nice house and yard right at the top of Main Street. This year they set up a pool too! The kids loved it!

Teague only went down the slide once, but he loved being in the pool.

Then he got out and danced around. Everytime! Apparently that's how he dries off now.

Ave action photo!

Teague and Auntie picking a nice spot for the big fireworks.

Papa and Ave enjoying the beautiful evening.

Teague found a play vacuum hose. It was probably his favorite toy of the night! I love that sky!

These 3 were so happy to be together - it was cute!

Ave sat with me during the fireworks. She loved them and described every one. It was an awesome fireworks show. Butte is so fun on the 4th.

Teague thought they were pretty cool too. On the way down the hill, Carter looked down Montana Street and said "This looks like Tokyo"! I think he got that from the movie CARS 2. It made me laugh! It was pretty true, all you could see was tail lights all the way down!

Time for a parade! Erica bought her some awesome sunglasses the day before.

They were excited to give the Bulldog some high fives!

Teague was a little subdued at first. He just sat there and waved his little flag.

Two cool cousins...one with his eyes closed!

I just love these four kiddos all decked out in their red, white, and blue. Jordo and Kyle are behind them.

Abb was in the parade with some of the other tumblers. She did a sweet back tuck right in front of us (that's why her hair is a little wild). The kids were excited to see her.

One more: red, white, and blue in order.

When we got back to Papa's house, the kids got out the new slip and slide Grandma found for them. It was a big hit!

Ave really enjoyed sliding on her knees. I didn't get a good picture of Landon, but Uncle Kyle taught him how to slide correctly down it. It was impressive.

Time to light off our own little bunch of fireworks. Do you think these guys were excited?

Ave stood like this and said, "This fountain is going to last all night I think."

Teague mostly just rode around on his "Eowyn horse". He's a Lord of the Rings fan. Or he makes it a bow and arrow and is Hawkeye. He kept everyone very entertained. My kids were thrilled to have both sets of Grandparents there. It was nice to have Dick and Diana get to see all the Butte festivitities. Thanks for coming!

These two laid down to get a good view of the artillery shells or whatever the big ones at the end were called.

Peek a Boo Teagie!

He stole Kyle's seat, and told Daddy he could sit on his lap!

Landon was very into the chest bump that night. I like how Dad's hands are in his pockets here.

There we go!

We decided to head to the Splash Pad with Landon while he was here. We always have fun there. My Carterman is a handsome fella.

Speaking of skinny little Landon, there he is. He was brave and went under the bucket quite a few times (once with his Mom!)

This guy is still pretty wimpy at the Splash Pad...probably because all the water is right at eye level for him. I love this face though! That's such a happy, real smile!

Miss Ave under the umbrella

All the boys drying out in the sun. Kyle really enjoyed cooling off with the kids.

Then  it was off to the park. Look how high Landon and Ave were going on the cowboy swings, and look at that sky. I love the summer here! Kyle and Carter were just getting started at the far swing there - ha ha!

Teague loved them too. Mom got some better pictures than me I think. I might have to add some more later.

Tire swing time! Hopefully we get a chance to go visit them in North Dakota this summer. It really sucks saying goodbye to them.

One little out of order picture here. Avery being so nice and reading to Teague (even thought he's not paying attention here).

Oops. I love the witch's hat. Ave swings her legs like a wild person on there. She hangs on for a really long time though. Hope everyone had as much fun as we did over the holiday!

It's Hot! I love it!

Here we go. I didn't delete any pictures this week! Yay! Summer really wears this guy out. Also, he's kind of a beast right now. He's definitely hit the terrible two's. He just argues and screams - he's so cute though luckily.

A typical night at our house when Kyle isn't working. Teague really wanted Kyle to wear his old football helmet. Why? We don't know, but he did.

And he's naked and carrying Avery's Cinderella bucket. He has a lovely build doesn't he? The nice thing was he didn't pee on the bed!

The Heisman pose - I told him it would be like the cop and the donut picture. He had to do it.

This is probably Teague's favorite spot to nap. Papa just is very relaxing to the Teagie-Pie.

We went to the wading pool up at the hospital two days in a row! I never used to be able to take them because it's only open M-F, which makes no sense to me. They loved it.

Carter and Ave loved to go under the mushroom. Teague is still a bit wary.

She's such a goofball. She makes me laugh all the time.

Speaking of goofballs, check out this guy. This is how he ran through the sprinkler at Papa's house, and he had his garbage can shield. Even Papa told him he was weird, and that's really saying something.

The next day we packed a picnic for the wading pool, and Terri met us up there.

Teague kept squeezing Carter's cheeks and talking nonsense to him. It was making us laugh.

Then he squeezed them too hard. Poor Carter. Teague is lucky he's so nice. A hug made it all better.

He has been loving the Wild Kratts show on PBS. He watches it with Carter. He was pressing his belly button to activate his creature power suit and turn into a hippo.

Carl and Jenny were in for their summer visit. The spent 3 days in Glacier with Mom and Dad. Then when they got here, Dad introduced them to the Headframe Distillery. We all enjoyed sampling different drinks!

They are just happy kids. Last night we took turns picking activities. Teague's was "store". The carts are always the Tonka ride-on and the Princess ride-on.

This morning, it was just me and Teague. Everyone else was sleeping and he was being so funny and lovey.

We made it to the Splash Pad today. That's Carter and Teague behind the bucket. I cleaned my camera lens after this. Someone's grubby fingers were all over it.

This is that someone. He loves to take pictures with my camera!

Carter is in the middle there with his hands on his head. He's getting so brave! His friend Sebastian was there today too. They had fun!

Avery and her friend Ashlyn from dance class found eachother too. They were under the bucket getting soaked! Everytime she wanted to dry off she just laid on the sidewalk. Teague decided to join her!

I've lost my mind!

I can't believe what I just did. I uploaded a few pictures on Wednesday...luckily. I just turned on my camera and deleted all the other pictures on it (thinking I had already uploaded them). Wow! I'm sad. There were only a few of them playing at Hillcrest playground and one from the movies today but still. The movie one was cute. It was outside the theatre by the Monsters University poster. We went today(Me, Kyle, Carter, Avery, Teague, Terri, Abbey, and Jordan). It was a cute show, and Teague slept through all but 15 minutes of it. Good thing I have a few from earlier in the week - enjoy all these pictures from 2 days!

They are so funny when they play with this beach ball sprinkler. Carter would have Landon flip it on it's side and then yell for Avery to get into "bottom formation". This apparently meant she had to cover the bottom sprinklers. Then he would "extricate some poison for his experiments". That doesn't sound good! Erica told him she thought only the Joker did that. Carter said his experiments were good though.

Landon taught Avery how to draw a star. We had many beautiful stars all over the sidewalk.

Teague always looks like he's really paying attention to what they are doing. He'll be a great student!

Pretty sure she was playing the guitar here. She just looks like she's having a really good time!

Muscle boy - this guy has gotten solid! He's losing teeth, and I can barely lift him...he's growing up! I don't think I like it...

Another muscle boy! This one is still very easy to swing around though. He's just hilarious. He told me the other day while he was scribbling all over some paper, "I got good jokes and bad jokes and I'm learning". He's my little clown.

I have pictures of me, Abb, and Jord in the front lawn doing this pose. It's a tradition! Teague refused to put down his "carousel fork" aka trident.

One more. Teague is there somewhere. He's not the most cooperative smiler.

This one is so cute. All the boys! Now we just need to get Lincoln in there. It makes me sad though too. I miss Lando.

They are all getting very good at sticking their faces in the water. I've got to get them back in swimming lessons for sure.

Erica brought her bed over. It now has a nice home in the purple room at Mom and Dad's house. Teague and Ave are especially loving it - these are some great smiles!

Teague wanted to lay just like Uncle Kyle. He kept looking over at him like, "Is this right?".

Lastly, we had to say goodbye that night. It was terrible, and I don't even like thinking about it. We are so happy for Erica, Landon, and Sean, but we are also selfish and wish they were here. We did some Facetime tonight. Their apartment looks great, but Carter just kept asking when we could visit. He kept saying, "Hey Cousin!" which always makes me laugh. They will all be thrilled to see eachother around the 4th of July. So...this was a weird little blog night. Hope everyone has more of a brain than me!