Richfield, Utah
The best place to celebrate the 4th with family has got to be hands down, what goes on in Richfield, Utah. This year we made our way to a anniversary spot of sorts to spend time with the Morgan Family. (Actually the Ogden family, but Mike's side of the family so we call it the Morgan Family.) And to celebrate Grandpa Foy's 90th birthday. (Yes, he turned 90 this year and that is an amazing accomplishment!!)
So we drove up to see him and to celebrate his birthday with the rest of the family. And of course to be thoroughly entertained by Richfield's consistent celebration of the day of our nations independence.
We missed most of Thursday's fun, cause that was the day we drove down.
Friday - The 4th:
Started out with the parade. (Although they have other things earlier, we just didn't get into town early enough for them.) We may have planned a month ahead for this excursion but we didn't get reservations in a Choice Hotel in Richfield, but Salina, a few miles up the road. Note to self, plan earlier if you mean to stay IN town. The parade was filled with floats and CANDY! Water and cars! Lots of cousins and kids to squeal at the fun stuff! And Alex decided to disappear on us. ACK! Yeah, the only thing is on the way in to find our party, we happened to see a bunch of air castles set up shop right down the street from where we were to met the family for the parade. Alex decided that he didn't want to wait and went off by himself. Which wasn't the best thing because he told no one where he went or that he was going. Not good.
So after a nerve wracking search that everyone helped out at, Mommy found him and carried him like a sack of potatoes back to the rest of our searching family. That just marked the beginning of the adventure for the day.
The afternoon consisted of a race for the kids, where they could win a silver half dollar. Pretty much everyone who participated got something. Following this activity, we invested our hopes in the fish catch where children can literally catch a real live fish to take home and do with as they'd like. FUN FUN FUN!! Alex and his cousins all tried to catch them. And it turns out that some of them did!! A few Hepner cousins and Clark Morgan, Alexander's 3 year old cousin! Amazing stuff! His secret weapon to catching fish, stomping on them!! No joke. Works wonders! If you joined this frenzy you'd definitely see how smart stomping really is for catching fish!!
As for Alex, maybe next year. This year it was just more exciting to touch them as they swam by.
After lunch and the races and fish catch, everyone crashed for a needed rest. Naps all around. Which sort of did but didn't happen for us. Okay though. No worries. We met back up around 6 pm to go swimming. Then we grabbed a bite to eat and headed for the Richfield Beauty School grass fields, or close to them, to watch the spectacular firework display for 2008! And we weren't disappointed. It was wonderful.
Ethan LOVED to watch the firecrackers. Last year, he wasn't even interested... in fact, he was asleep and we were driving home and only saw a bunch of fireworks across the Phoenix skyline as we headed home. (We really bombed out of that one last year.) By the end of the evening, the kids were tired, excited, and it was 10pm ish. Because of day light savings in Utah, it didn't even get dark until 9pm! Can you believe that? Arizona isn't on Day light savings so it gets dark around 7:30pm.
The boys were out by time we got 5 minutes down the road. And they crashed hard when we got back to our room!
What an amazing 4th!!
So we drove up to see him and to celebrate his birthday with the rest of the family. And of course to be thoroughly entertained by Richfield's consistent celebration of the day of our nations independence.
We missed most of Thursday's fun, cause that was the day we drove down.
Friday - The 4th:
Started out with the parade. (Although they have other things earlier, we just didn't get into town early enough for them.) We may have planned a month ahead for this excursion but we didn't get reservations in a Choice Hotel in Richfield, but Salina, a few miles up the road. Note to self, plan earlier if you mean to stay IN town. The parade was filled with floats and CANDY! Water and cars! Lots of cousins and kids to squeal at the fun stuff! And Alex decided to disappear on us. ACK! Yeah, the only thing is on the way in to find our party, we happened to see a bunch of air castles set up shop right down the street from where we were to met the family for the parade. Alex decided that he didn't want to wait and went off by himself. Which wasn't the best thing because he told no one where he went or that he was going. Not good.
So after a nerve wracking search that everyone helped out at, Mommy found him and carried him like a sack of potatoes back to the rest of our searching family. That just marked the beginning of the adventure for the day.
The afternoon consisted of a race for the kids, where they could win a silver half dollar. Pretty much everyone who participated got something. Following this activity, we invested our hopes in the fish catch where children can literally catch a real live fish to take home and do with as they'd like. FUN FUN FUN!! Alex and his cousins all tried to catch them. And it turns out that some of them did!! A few Hepner cousins and Clark Morgan, Alexander's 3 year old cousin! Amazing stuff! His secret weapon to catching fish, stomping on them!! No joke. Works wonders! If you joined this frenzy you'd definitely see how smart stomping really is for catching fish!!
As for Alex, maybe next year. This year it was just more exciting to touch them as they swam by.
After lunch and the races and fish catch, everyone crashed for a needed rest. Naps all around. Which sort of did but didn't happen for us. Okay though. No worries. We met back up around 6 pm to go swimming. Then we grabbed a bite to eat and headed for the Richfield Beauty School grass fields, or close to them, to watch the spectacular firework display for 2008! And we weren't disappointed. It was wonderful.
Ethan LOVED to watch the firecrackers. Last year, he wasn't even interested... in fact, he was asleep and we were driving home and only saw a bunch of fireworks across the Phoenix skyline as we headed home. (We really bombed out of that one last year.) By the end of the evening, the kids were tired, excited, and it was 10pm ish. Because of day light savings in Utah, it didn't even get dark until 9pm! Can you believe that? Arizona isn't on Day light savings so it gets dark around 7:30pm.
The boys were out by time we got 5 minutes down the road. And they crashed hard when we got back to our room!
What an amazing 4th!!