Happy 4th of July

We celebrated this Independence Day with Ella's first campout, which was on Cedar Mountain. Bryson says car camping is not real camping, but when you're 9 months pregnant, hey, it works. Ella loved the FIRE, sleeping all together in a two-man tent (time to upgrade!), and just being outside. She made the bugs little houses to play in out of rocks and sticks and spent a lot of time just throwing rocks in the creek. We also found out that Bryson is an expert marshmallow roaster. Seriously, he made s'mores that were absolutely perfect!

On the 4th, we watched a Country concert and fireworks downtown. Ella is just starting to recognize her letters and every time we'd take her up the stadium stairs she'd point out mommy's special letter ("K"), daddy's special letter ("B"), and Ella's special letter ("E"). She sometimes recognizes Nana's special letter too, but apparently Nana must have a variety of spellings because that one is not always an "N." This was the first year that Ella really got into all the festivities and didn't cry when the fireworks started. She was tickled about sparklers and the big fireworks and she never seems to have a problem staying up late. Since we were directly under the fireworks this year, we had an awesome view, but we also caught a lot of ash. We just put my sunglasses on Ella and she was good to go.