Our Hearts Beat Red, White, & Blue

I am so thankful to live in a free country where we have the freedoms of religion, speech, and so many other things. We wouldn't be any where close to where we are now without the brave men and women who serve and fight for our country's freedoms. Thank you. I also know without a doubt that our Founding Fathers were guided and directed by our Heavenly Father organize this nation. Every year growing up my dad would make us kids watch this video of the signing of the Declaration of Independence. I think, actually, I know we all hated it because we had to watch it every year. However, when you grow up, you always realize your parents were right -- so now I know my dad was right in making us watch this important event. I have a firm belief, love, and admiration for everyone who helped create such a wonderful country. That's one reason why I love the this holiday -- I get to celebrate the love I have for my country!

We had a pretty awesome 4th (well, 3rd really) of July. Here in Rexburg everyone is LDS, so we had all the 4th's festivities on Saturday instead. It started out with the parade, which was pretty cool. Since it was Gabe's first parade, I was excited for him, but he didn't really like all the loud noises. He even cried during the fire trucks (maybe next year?). Then we met Jill and her roommates at the park for a BBQ. Ale grilled us some good steaks, hot dogs, and hamburgers and we laid on the grass talking and playing games.

 We had been planning for weeks to take Gabe to the fireworks here in Rexburg. I was soooo, sooo excited to have him experience that. However, Gabe has been super cranky the past couple of days, with Friday him having a fever of 102. It went down and everything, but he still was in a really bad mood today. Then I realized/saw his 7th tooth coming in. Oh my! So I promptly put orajel on it. He was still a little fussy pants and really tired, so we just decided to put him to bed early Saturday night and not take him to the fireworks. I was bummed because I love fireworks, so Ale said he would stay home and let me go to Idaho Falls with Jill to see the fireworks. I'm glad I did because that was one of the best shows I have ever seen!  Here are some pictures from the day (except the nakie pic, that was from a few days ago, but I thought it was cute):

{He didn't like the loud fire trucks}

With Jill and some of her roomies at the fireworks. We actually were so close that we could see the fireworks leaving their "cannons." And it was on the river so we saw the reflection of the fireworks off of the water. It was breathtakingly beautiful.

Happy Fourth of July!

{And if you're wondering why Alejandro's not in any of the pictures it's because the pictures I did take of him -- he was making the ugliest/stupidest faces, so he doesn't get to make it on the blog this holiday post -- sorry!}