A Star is Born

Ella and her friend, Jackson, made the local paper, The Ridgewood News, on 4th of July. They were the cover of the Arts & Leisure section (click to enlarge).

Happy 4th of July!

We hope you all had a nice 4th of July.

We had a wonderful day despite the weather being so-so. It was pretty much overcast all day and when we started to head out to watch the fireworks it started to rain so we just came home, lit some sparklers and then attempted to watch the NYC fireworks on TV. I say attempted, because by 9:00 pm Ella's eyes were so heavy so could barely hold them open, so we just dvr'd them and will watch them tonight.

We started out our day by going to the parade in Ridgewood. Lucky for us, our friend Michelle's cousin Rachel put out chairs a couple days before, so we got a prime location. And yes, people do put out chairs days in advance for this small town parade! You'd think it's the Olympics. What's funniest to me is that no one steals these chairs in the days proceeding the parade. Now that's small town America at it's finest!

So a group of us parked at Rachel and Mike's house in Ridgewood and walked over to our chairs and enjoyed the parade.

Ella LOVED it. We all bought the kids these ridiculous plastic trumpets and they loved them. Any time a band walked by, Ella would spot the trumpet players and start blowing her trumpet too.

I know it's cheesy, but I teared up a little bit while sitting there with Ella on my lap. She was having such a good time watching the parade. I loved watching her little mind soak up all that she was seeing. I loved making a memory with her. It's moments like this that make all the trial and tribulations of parenting worth it.

Even though it was nap time, Sofia enjoyed the parade too. Rachel and her husband Mike have an adorable 12 week old golden retriever named Barney who joined us for the parade. I forgot to get a picture of him but he was a star! Everyone stopped to say hi to him. He's just adorable. So adorable in fact, Sofia said a new word....repeatedly! DOGGY! So now she says Hi and Doggy!

Our attempt at a family picture is becoming futile.

Both girls were exhausted after the parade so we came home and both girls took monster naps. While napping I made corn bread muffins and cupcakes and when they woke, we headed back out to dinner at the Klein's house...this was not a day for a BBQ unfortunately, so we stayed inside. The kids didn't seem to mind.

Spiderman even made an apperance (Sofia says: My hero!)

Charlotte and Ella eating the cupcakes.

Charlotte and Sofia had on the same top, I tried in vein to get a picture of them together but they were all just too busy. This is the closest I got.

It was a wonderful day. The girls were great, the company was fabulous, and the food even better.

Today we're just relaxing and trying to catch up on sleep. Tonight Ricardo and I are going on a triple date (how high school!) with some friends of ours from Ella's school.

Happy 4th of July!