Fourth of July!

I hope everyone had a great weekend celebrating our country's independence! We hosted Matt's (mostly) entire family for the weekend and couldn't have had a better time. We didn't know how it would go for a couple of reasons: 1) We were going to have 17 people over and we weren't sure how our new, shy dog would react (Oh, I need a post on Hardy, don't I??) and 2) Our AC downstairs broke Thursday evening. Yes. In Texas. Over 4th of July weekend. The joys of homeownership, right? 

I will spare you the suspense and let you know it all worked out. Even though we had a second location we could use if needed, we were able to make our AC limp along for the weekend and it never felt too, too hot! Our AC is fixed as of this writing (Wednesday afternoon), so here is hoping it sticks for the rest of the summer...

But anyway, back to the 4th. We all had a great time hanging out, playing games, playing with my adorable 5-month old niece, and eating. I am really enjoying hosting people in our home and so glad we bought this particular house with that in mind. Even though we had 17 people in the house, it never felt too crowded and people were able to spread out and be comfortable. There were also some fun nerf battles that happened, too, because cousins :)

Here are some pictures, courtesy of my mother-in-law, because I was a bit too busy to think about breaking out my camera. So glad she shared these with me as I love looking through them. I hope you do, too!

Because when one of the cousins owns a unicorn onesie, you have to :)

Father & son both wearing fox shirts

Based on this picture, you would think we only ate healthy.
This doesn't include the 3 different types of cookies, 2 kinds
of brownies, 2 pans of apple crisp, and vanilla ice cream that
was also available :)

Hardy and baby Bethany were quite interested in one another, but
neither knew what to make of the other. So cute! 

Bench pressing of the youngest cousin

Avocado is pretty delicious!

Bethany and the great grandmother  :)

Evidence that Hardy can indeed sit on other people's laps besides
Matt or mine. I wouldn't have believed it, either.

No 4th of July post would be complete without fireworks :)