Fireworks, grilling, and mud wrestling

What do you do with a three day holiday weekend if not scads of back breaking yard work?  Or maybe that's just us, but it has definitely become a trend this year at our house.  Memorial Day weekend saw us ripping sod and moving bushes, and the Fourth of July weekend found us digging a massive mud pit in our backyard.  A massive mud pit, you ask?  Well, what started out as a not so dry creek routing the downspout and sump pump water in the direction of the drain in our back yard quickly went from a two day project to what I can only assume is going be at least a two week project when we decided to add an 8x16 (that's feet, not inches) rain garden at the foot of said not so dry creek.  It's a well meaning effort, meant to lessen our contribution to the polluted rain runoff in our waterways while beautifying our backyard view, but the process can only be described as dirty and exhausting - removing sod, digging down eight inches, building up a berm, hauling rocks, hauling compost, sand, and dirt, all while the sump pump continues to send water in our muddy direction - and the project is as yet unfinished.  Now that the three day weekend is drawing to a close... we are definitely ready for next weekend to be here.

Of course, we did get in our fair share of partying, grilling, and great company this weekend, too, which are probably the more common Fourth of July activities across the board.  We partied Friday night with our family, Calvin's second cousin Iris and her family, a frog pool, a golf set, a T-ball set, some great grilling, and strawberry shortcake.  That was so much fun that we repeated the celebrations on Saturday with our family, our friend, Patty and her family, more water fun, more great grilling (smoking, actually), and more strawberry shortcake.  And we topped both nights off with sparklers and fireworks, which Calvin found to be "banging banging eek banging banging" fun.  Now if only we could manage at least one three day festive weekend every month...

More pictures in the July 2008 album.