Ten on Tue

1. Happy 4th of July...I know it's over, but I still had to post one last salutation for the holiday. This whole weekend has been non-stop celebrating!

2. Parties without end...Yes, you read that right! How many people do you know get to celebrate their birthday plus a holiday at the same time. Every couple of years, my birthday will fall on Memorial Day but Leroy Jr and Leroy Sr get a double celebration each year!

3. Birthday Boys...The birthday boy's celebrated another year together! Leroy's sister and family came down from Kansas City for the combined party. Uncle Lawrence did some serious BBQing again and the brisket was excellent plus the ice cream cake from DQ was delicious! I'm sure my thighs are showing it...hee hee! We went down to the lake after the festivities. The air finally started to cool off due to a storm blowing in but it past over us, thank goodness! The kids plus their nephew went fishing at Lake Loch Lomand but they didn't catch anything...bummer! Leah and Eric went swimming in the lake! All was going well, until Eric went a little bit too far out in the water and I had to jump into the lake to rescue him. Oh, I didn't have a swimsuit on, so I had to jump in fully clothed. So, I ended up swimming around in the lake with the kids. Overall, a fun night with the family!

4. Bella Vista 4th of July Fireworks display...Sunday evening, we headed over to Lake Loch Lomand Dam to watch the fireworks show. This is a family tradition, we go every year. We decided to park right up in front next to the dam to watch the display instead of going in the back like we normally do! Big mistake, watching the fireworks up front was fun but trying to get home was a complete nightmare. The drive home ended up being over one hour to get home. Arghh...the cops weren't being nice and it took forever. Lesson learned back to parking in the back lot and hopefully we will get out faster next time.

5. Old Fashioin 4th of July celebration...My best friend "V" invited us to come join her families first ever 4th party at Lake Loch Lomand. Now, this party was really interesting because we really didn't know too many people at the party. I'm really shy around new people but it only took me a few minutes to jump right in and have a blast. The party was held out at Tiree Park at the lake. I'm thinking about maybe hosting my own party out their for the kids. The park had a nice Pavilion, shuffleboard, park, horse shoes, bathrooms, and of course lake access! The kids had sooooo much fun. Landon won a set of Hillbilly Golf and the kids had a ton of fun playing with it. We managed to do all of the typical party games like water balloons, horse shoes, playing at the park, fishing, and swimming at the lake. The end of the party we all went down to the lake and they put on a HUGE fireworks show. It was so long, that we decided to sneak out and leave early. The kids were so tired from staying up late the night before watching the fireworks at the dam. So, Leroy thought that "V" and me were up to no good. He was sitting down at the pier with us and decided to spend most of the night riding his bike. Yeah, we were up to no good but we didn't dunk him into the lake that will be next year's plan. We surprised him with everyone signing "Happy Birthday" right before the big firework's show!

6. 4th of July Firecracker 5k race...Landon and I decided to wake up early and head down to Lake Atlanta in Rogers for this race. I ran in this race about three years ago with my old running partner and this year I decided to give it another shot but with my son. Let's just say that Landon kicked my butt. It's official, I can't even keep up with my son anymore. Landon managed to come in 3rd place for his age group which is awesome because he hasn't practice or done any training at all. This kid is a natural!

7. Important Announcement...I almost forgot, we will be remodeling our house. We will be adding onto the sunroom by making it bigger plus it will be 4 seasons plus we will be adding a new deck! Hopefully, we will be starting on this project in about two weeks! The sunroom will be like a really big family room. We have been wanting to do this for a very long time and it's about to happen!

8. A healthy Body...is not to be taken for granted! I have learned a couple of hard lessons this year about not taking a healthy body for granted. I feel like all of my sport injuries have finally healed but I need to learn to listen to my body. I'm getting older, it's time that I make sure I'm eating right, getting enough sleep, and listening to my body. I feel so blessed but I need to make sure that I don't ever take it for granted!

9. New Opportunities...I just signed up to become a Heritage Makers consultant. I'm probably not going to start up anything until the kids are back in school in the fall. If you haven't started digital scrap booking, you're missing out. It's so easy plus it's not messy like regular scrap booking.

10. Civil War History...Living in the South, we have the opportunities to learn more about the civil war. Landon and Wyatt his friend needed to visit a historical site to earn one of their merit badges. So, we headed over to Pea Ridge National Park which is a National Park. We spent literally the whole day exploring the park and we went on a seven mile bike tour of the park. The kids even managed to become JR. park rangers.