4th of July birthday

 Kent's birthday is the 4th of July.
It's pretty much the best day to have a birthday ever.

On Friday, Nicholas woke up very early.  He was WAY more excited about Kent's birthday than Kent was.
So I took him downstairs (to let Daddy sleep in a tiny bit) and we made cupcakes. Tres Leche with peaches and strawberries on top.  
Cupcakes for breakfast is always a good thing.

Nicholas was so excited about the presents.  The day before, I'd taken the kids to the store and let them pick out presents for Kent, all on their own (as long as they were less than $5.)  
Then, they also got to pick the wrapping paper and help me wrap them. 

Nicholas chose the heart wrapping paper for the biggest box because "Then Daddy will see how much I love him!"

As I was prepping breakfast, Nicholas arranged the presents into a smiley face, "to make Daddy happy that it's his birthday!"

At some point between present arranging and present opening, Nicholas dressed himself with shorts and then a pair of underwear on the outside....

And, this is the present Nicholas chose for Kent.  Toy dinosaurs.  At the store, Nick picked those right away, "Because they're SO awesome, and Daddy loves dinosaurs."  When Kent opened them, Nicholas suggested that maybe, it would be fun to share them?

Ellie gave Kent a package of cookies, also suggesting that he share them.

After breakfast, we loaded up the van and drove to my parents' house to spend the weekend.  

That night, after dinner we set up lots of chairs, a couple of tables, and loaded them with things to be roasted:

Strawberries dipped in marshmallow fluff

S'mores with raspberries and nutella (Oh.My.Delicious.)

"wolf-'ems" (Also super delicious)

Rice Krispy treats

string cheese wrapped in biscuit dough

fruit, chocolate, marshmallows, and lots of grahams.

We called it our "Flambe Buffet." 

Because it's fun to say.

And fun to do:

We'd put the kids to bed before we even started this, because we followed it up with fireworks,
and I'm tired of trying to convince Nicholas to not be afraid of fireworks. No matter what we say, he just screams and wants to go inside.
It's just not happening.
So we put them in bed, and they slept soundly through the whole night.

Which is actually amazing.
Because...
Halfway through our fireworks show (Kent and some of my cousins were lighting them off) we might have kinda started several fires in the field, exploded fireworks into the crowd, and possibly even hit one person.
Our fireworks launching board apparently wasn't sturdy enough.  One arial tipped over and went haywire.  Thankfully, oh so thankfully, no one was seriously injured. And Kent dashed to the rescue and stomped out the field fires before they spread.

All's well that ends well, right?  We won't be forgetting this birthday anytime soon!