Every summer we go to Kansas. Why in the summer? I have no idea. It is always SO.DANG.HOT! Really it is because the Mays come to Colorado around Christmas so the middle of summer is the halfway point and we can only go about 6 months without seeing each other! HAHA. Long story short we are working on a new plan but this time I wanted to make sure we were in stinking hot Kansas over 4th of July so that we could shoot off FIREWORKS!

John & Mere were in our wedding eight years ago and since then we have both had two kids which made our most recent hang include 4 kids, 4 and under! Ollie would probably like me to point out that he is four and a half so I’ll do that. We’ve loved seeing these kiddos grow up together and every time it gets more fun as they play together more! Before we know it we will be sending them all to camp together! And if you want more history on our friendship, read this post I wrote after they moved away and try not to cry 😉

Now this will probably be a surprise to many of you but I have NEVER SHOT OFF FIREWORKS BEFORE! Here in Colorado it is illegal to shoot off your own fireworks. We are always in a drought and there are always forest fires so it is a no-go on the fireworks. In fact, I really wanted sparklers at our wedding but we couldn’t. When we were at the booth picking up our fireworks, Bruce & I both felt like we were totally breaking the law. I couldn’t get over all the families loading up carts with fireworks – it was such a new experience for me!

And this one will probably not come as a surprise to you, but I LOVED IT! And so did Hilde! We bought a bunch of random things too shoot off after dinner and then the neighbors joined in as the sun went down shooting off hundreds of dollars of fireworks and we enjoyed the show they gave us!

I’m dying over all the Midwest Americana photos we took while we were there out in the farmlands and how cute we all looked in our 4th of July outfits! This post is photo heavy but it is just because there are too many cute ones! So much love for these people and these memories!