Our friends came over for a playdate and the girls put on makeup.
The kids set up for dinner and a movie while Ty had our anniversary date in the kitchen.
Enjoying our at home date night for our 9th anniversary.
Peacock at the zoo, the kids were too scared to get close enough for a picture.
Carter held Elise up so she could see better!
Carter with my friend's chickens.
My friend invited us over to her house to pick from her garden.
Our haul from my friend's garden.
Elise ate an entire tomato like it was an apple!
Eli came out and we got to see him while staying distant. He showed us his 4-wheeler!
Carter cashed in his coupon for dinner and a movie. Elise looked so cozy!
Tesla loved Homeward Bound!
They made a hamster castle for the hamsters.
Carter cashed in his coupon for an ice cream treat and made himself a banana split. He also used his pajama day coupon.
Elise saw Carter's and had to use her coupon too!
Carter cashed in his coupon for an ice cream treat and made himself a banana split. He also used his pajama day coupon.
Elise used her plan the all our activities for the day coupon. She decided to drive to visit Oma and Opa even though I told her we wouldn't be able to spend the night.
We went to the school to pick up free lunch and they gave us a packet of free books! Each kid got 10 books and some activities!
Our anniversary, July 9th, fell on a Thursday this year. With Ty working in the shop at his new job he has been going into work at 5am and working until 4:30-5:15 pm. It has been crazy. They got to go in a little later on our anniversary and he didn't need to leave for work until 5:35am so I was able to get up at 5am and sneak my run in before the left for work. That way we'd have the evening to celebrate! With everything that's going on, there was no way we were going to eat at a restaurant. Ty and I were talking at dinner earlier in the week about what we wanted to do for our anniversary. Elise asked what an anniversary was and Carter said, "It's the day Uncie Taco comes to watch us and mommy and daddy go out to dinner." I thought that was so cute. We talked it over and decided to let the kids have a special movie/dinner night in the living room. They could eat dinner while watching a movie and Ty and I would have a little date night in the kitchen. We even shut the pocket door so it was quieter for our date plus it kept Tesla out of the living room so she wouldn't try to sneak their food as they watched the movie! On Thursday Thomas realized it was our anniversary and called to see if we wanted to drop the kids off at his house and he'd hang out with them in the backyard while we went somewhere. It was a nice offer but it had rained that morning and the only place I could think of I'd like to go would be maybe to a park to have a picnic and the ground would be all wet, so we stuck with our original plan.
My parents sent Ty some steaks for Father's Day so he grilled those to go with some twice baked potatoes that came with them. As an appetizer we ate strawberries dipped in whipped cream, cause it's our anniversary so we can! Haha! It was so nice to sit and chat over dinner and a date night at home was actually pretty wonderful! For dessert we had ice cream cake which I put on our last Wal-Mart pickup order. This year since the kids were still up and Ty had to go to bed early since he had to be at work at 5am the next morning, we watched our wedding video with the kids. Paul should feel special because every year Ty messes around on his phone and doesn't really watch until Paul gets up to give his toast and then Ty sets his phone done. It's pretty cute he enjoys the speech that much. The kids wanted to see me in my dress so I went ahead and put it on for them. Once they were in bed Ty and I danced to our songs. It was again a nice day to remember where everything started and how far we've come. I'm so glad our plans for our 10th anniversary involve being outdoors alone instead of some big trip so we don't have to worry about covid-19 still being an issue and possibly interfering with big travel plans or anything!
Here's a list of the extra song we've danced to each year:
2011- Whatever It Is by Zac Brown Band (our first dance)
2012- Feet Don't Touch the Ground by Stoney LaRue
2013- Born to Love You by Ben Harper
2014- I Don't Dance by Lee Brice
2015- Thinking Out Loud by Ed Sheeran
2016- Die A Happy Man by Thomas Rhett
2017- Slow Hands by Niall Horan
2018- Perfect by Ed Sheeran
2019- Speechless by Dan Shay
2020- Watermelon Sugar by Harry Styles
We usually spend the 4th of July with my family at my parents' house. We run the Firecracker 5k in the morning and follow that up with breakfast at McDonald's and fireworks and fun for the rest of the day. Since the coronavirus numbers in Oklahoma continue to sky rocket we didn't want to take the chance of exposing my parents if we are unwittingly carrying the virus, so we stayed home. Ty loved the bison medal for the Run OK Virtual event and wanted to sign up for the 5k. He hadn't been running but planned to finish the 5k on July 4th since the event ended on the 5th. We decided to make his 5k run into a Family Firecracker 5k. I ran the half marathon the day before and it didn't go well so I was a little unsure of how I would feel the following day. Ty said he'd likely have to walk a bit and I was totally fine with that. Carter rode his bike, Ty ran, I ran with the stroller, and Elise ran some segments and hopped in the stroller to ride the rest of the time. Elise took off running and ran about the first quarter-mile. Then she was in and out of the stroller quite a bit on the way out. After the turn around she wanted to ride in the stroller the rest of the way. Carter wobbled a little bit and scraped his leg a little after the turn around and cried and wanted to walk for a while. I told Ty to go ahead without us since he was running the race. Eventually I talked Carter into getting back on his bike. He decided to ride so slowly I couldn't even run that slow and then going up hill he just tipped his bike to the side and laid on the ground while I waited at the top of the hill for him. It was a bit annoying but we finally finished and he turned it around the last half-mile and did great. On the way home we went through the drive thru at McDonald's for a special breakfast.
Carter ready to ride his bike during our Family Firecracker 5K.
Me and Elise ready to run!
When we got home we ate our breakfast and then got ready for the day. The kids and I went to a firework stand a few days beforehand to pick up fireworks. We had fun setting off fireworks. Then I made lunch and brought it outside for us to eat. I tried to make red, white, and blue smoothies but the strawberry smoothie I made looked more pink, the whipped cream didn't show up, and the blueberry smoothie looked more purple. But the kids still thought they were really cool because they were 2 separate layers. I cut chicken nuggets into stars and used to ketchup to make them look like part of an American flag on the plate.
After lunch it was time for more fireworks. Elise loves to play with the snakes after they are done so she was super filthy. She cracks me up! Carter wanted to wear his headphones even when setting up smoke bombs which I found super entertaining since they don't make much noise at all! Elise wanted to light fireworks on her own this year. After she'd get the smoke bomb going she really took off running to get away. It was super cute. Tesla isn't a fan of fireworks, but she wanted to be outside with us. She decided she'd just sit in Ty's lap so she'd feel better about being outside around fireworks.
Elise loves playing with the snakes and gets super messy!
Tesla was a little scared of the fireworks and climbed on Ty's lap.
Elise consoling Tesla over the fireworks.
While we waited for it to get dark so we could do our nighttime fireworks, we filled up our little swimming pool. Ty grilled burgers and fried zucchini for dinner. We took Ty's speaker outside and had a little dance party. Then the kids were in and out of the pool, going from the pool to the trampoline. They wanted me in the pool with them but it had just rained a little and the temperature dropped when that happened, so it was a little chilly for me! We did a few fireworks after dinner and then it was off to bed. It was a great day even though it was different than our norm! Carter told me normally we have more fireworks because Oma buys more when we start to run out, haha! Read about our celebrations in previous years: 2019 here, 2018 here, 2017 here, 2016 here, 2015 here, 2014 here, and 2013 here.
