Oh, Life...

...I have 2 good friends who are having upheavals of sorts in their lives. Please keep them in your thoughts and prayers.

Our high school youth is in ECUADOR right now. I'm jealous, and I know that they're having an awesome time. I can't wait for them to come back so I can hear all about it and see pictures!

This year was my first FULL Fourth of July at home since 2001. Yes, you read that right: 2001. I've been at camp every summer since then. and the 4th had fallen in the middle of a session every year till last year when they started a week earlier. Last year, you may remember, the 4th was on a Friday, which meant that it fell on the last day of a session. So I was home that night, but not all day. That was weird, too, though. Every year prior, I would shoot off fireworks the weekend before the Fourth with the hubs (who wasn't the hubs yet) and an assortment of international staff members from camp.

A family in my church owns a firework stand in St. Pete and we always bought from them. on the 4th, the hubby and I went to his step-sister's and shot off a whole bunch of stuff, even in the rain and the lightning (I know, we're bright...). then last night, we went to the family that owns the stand and watched them shoot off a bunch of leftover inventory. (They have to buy all of their product, so what they don't sell they save for next year as well as shoot it off at this annual show.) It was pretty cool. They were exploding all these cool fireworks and we were having a pretty good time. No fatalities, though a shell did fly over and hit my friend's boyfriend's chest and burned him a little bit. Here are some photos I got on my little Canon digital point and shoot. (Not too bad, if I say so myself!)

**You'll have to click on the photos to see all of it... even when I make them "small," Blogspot doesn't seem to want to make them blog-friendly!**

I'm pretty sure we shot off just about all of these:


B and J setting up the Grand Finale:





Oh, by the way, the shop put in new grounding wires on my car's starter and it's working now. hopefully it stays that way! LOL. (knock wood!!

Reception

First, I want to apologize real quick for my page's appearance the last few days. I cancelled my web hosting service where my layout images were hosted, so you got the pretty error message for the last day or two. oops! I've fixed it, though (obviously).

We had the hall booked till 10 and from abotu 7:30 till then, the dance floor was hoppin'! I had a lot of old friends and a lot of really good camp friends there and it was so much fun to let loose on the dance floor. I can't dance for anything, but I was the bride, so it was okay that I SUCKED. Ha ha.

J's little cousin Summer who's about 6 said at one point that she didn't know how to dance, and I told her to just let loose and do it, LOL. She was all over me all night (little girls like brides, I was reminded). I only feel bad that the other kids her age (J's other cousins on his dad's side) left so early; and my brother took my niece and nephew home right after the ceremony for a nap and didn't bring them back. :-(

Anyway, our special dances were incredibly sweet and I loved dancing with my dad. My stepdad and I had chosen a special song of our own, not to be announced as a special dance, but just something for us to partake in. Well, the DJ ended up announcing it and I'm actually really glad that he did because it was nice having that special moment with him; he's been jsut as instrumental in my upbringing as my dad has been, and it was nice to share that moment.

At some point in the evening, our bridal party wen out and went a little crazy with the glass chalk on my car. I had the requisite "Just Married" and some "Congrats" on each side of the car. They also painted on my hood and trunk, though, which I found really funny at first, but now that the time has come for it to come off, I'm incredibly annoyed at it, LOL. It's really hard to get off.

My mom sprung for a hotel room for us that night and it was lovely. It was nice ot go somewhere by ourselves that night and reflect on the day.

Overall, that whole day is a day that I will never ever forget. (Which is how it should be, right?) Everything went smoothly and there were few glitches (and even the few that we had, I was able to get over real quick), but it was amazing.

Oh, and if you'd like to see pictures, I have them up on Flicker.