Usually we find ourselves camping over the Fourth of July each year, but this year my dad was on call for work and so was I. So we decided to hit the local festivities. In Centerville, the fireworks were on Friday night, and then my family likes to get up and go to breakfast before the parade at 9. For a 2 and 4 year old, that isn’t much sleep. So we decided to ghetto camp this year. Cami will be embarrassed that I made it public knowledge, but it was a lot of fun. We took our trailer over to my mom’s house and camped out in the backyard. Peter brought his as well. David and Katie slept over. Julie and Tyson were there. April hung out for a bit. We just had a big long weekend at my mom’s house.

For the Centerville fireworks, we went up on the side of the mountain up above the city and watched the fireworks.  We actually got a double header–West Bountiful did their fireworks a few minutes after Centerville finished. Of course, I took pictures.

Then we got up for breakfast at IHOP and then sat in the hot sun and watched the parade. What kid doesn’t love having permission to play in the road and take candy from strangers?

Not exactly sure what happened to here leg here…

Jayci was particularly proud of her glass slipper she had thrown to her.

I played around a bit with a new photography technique called HDR during the parade.

After the kids took a nap, Cami, Martha, and I took them down to the park for some lunch and the festivities. The kids got to play in the bounce houses and had a blast on one of the obstacle courses. I had to help Corbin through the first couple times, but then he really got the hang of it.  I nearly killed myself trying to roll down the last hill.

Jayci wouldn’t go home until we went and played on the playground. Instead of going to the crowded one at the park, we went across the street to the school and the kids were by themselves. I played around with some more HDR.

Saturday night, mom and dad bbq’d some teryaki chicken and we had some chips and watermelon in the backyard. Cami and I brought the fixins for some patriotic drinks.

Grandma had some bubbles for the kids, and Cami bought them some interesting bubble blowing PVC pipe things at the park. Of course, I had to be a good dad and test them out thoroughly to make sure they were safe for the kids.

Then we sat around the fire and roasted marshmallows and socialized for a bit.

And I did some more playing with photos and HDR.

Then Pete and I got up on top of his trailer to get some pictures of the sunset.

The weekend wouldn’t be complete without a few pictures of the kids together.

On Sunday night we made our way to Applebee’s for dinner and I played a bit more with my camera and Pete’s beer.

We stayed at Mom’s until Monday morning and then we headed home and got ourselves ready for more fireworks and dinner in Farr West with Pete and Wendy. The greek food there is awesome. And the kids talked mom into a snow cone.

We were up close and personal with the fireworks.