on to the 24th of July

For the 24th we had my mom and my sister Darla and her boys (visiting from Chicago) with us. We started out with the traditional breakfast of biscuits and gravy. We then hit the parade long enough to see Nick and his float for the bank. We went over to the carnival for the boys to go on a few rides during the parade so there were no lines--heck they were pretty much the only ones ON the rides.

We then did our favorite 24th tradition...Taste of the Valley. About 20 or so restaurants from around the valley all get together and give out samples. You get so many great things and you leave completely stuffed--and we only hit about half of the vendors. It keeps getting bigger every year--I think there were about 3000 people this year. We went with our friends Lon & Rebecca and Shane & Allyson.

Later that night a bunch of people got together at our house for snacks and some lame fireworks we bought that sucked!! Finally at about 10:45 the city fireworks started. They shoot them off a couple of blocks away from our house so we have a perfect view. Of course, Sam didn't stay awake long enough for those either....