Happy 4th!

 I hope you all had a wonderful Fourth of July.  We certainly did. We made these cool hand and foot print flags on the third in the daycare.  This is my eight year old's flag.

 And this is the 1 year old's.  I used extra large paper for the older kids and regular computer paper for the 1 year olds'.

 Here are the daycare kids' flags.  My three year old refused.  He didn't want to stick his hands or feet in the paint, but crawled into the tub of water I had set out for washing up :)

 (My eight year old took these pictures) This was me helping the 1 year old do his footprints.

 The daycare was closed for the Fourth, so we headed out on the boat for a day of fishing.

 I don't know if you can see it in this picture, but there is a tree about a third of the way over from the right side with a large nest in the top.

 It is an osprey nest, and the bird was in it.  There are many of these nests all around the lake, and the birds are usually close by.  They're pretty cool.

 The three year old is all about watching the water.  He's a little too brave, and will lean out over the edge of the boat.  That's why he has a life jacket though.  If he ever does fall in, he'll learn not to lean over the edge so far :)

 We put a cooler between the front and back sections of the boat, and made the front a baby playpen.  The baby loved it.  He could crawl around up there, and had a few toys too.  The eight year old enjoyed keeping him company.

 Of course what would the Fourth be without fireworks?  The town had considered not doing them this year - with all the fires burning, but ultimately decided to go ahead.  The three year old has always been terrified of them - too loud and scary, and it looked like he was going to continue that feeling.  He refused to even look at them for more than halfway through.  Finally he started peeking because I was asking him what colors they were, and saying, "ooh, pretty red" and stuff like that.  I knew he was peeking when he said they looked like stars and flowers.  He still didn't really like them, but we definitely made progress.  Anyway, here are a few of my favorite pictures from the fireworks show...