July 4th

July 4th.  Yesterday, right?

July 4th used to be our (almost) half-way summer point, but this year with the start of Chip's summer break (he was off the entire month of July- woohoo!), it was more like our kick off.

As usual, we spent the 4th on the beach. Only there wasn't much reading or napping going on this year.

We were busy playing in the sand.

PaPa was good at building at sand castles.

Daddy was the resident lake builder. He had two helpers who
were quite good at helping fill it with water.

One of the helpers caught "playing" on the job.

The other helper made a "beautiful rainbow" right
there beside it.  (you have to just imagine the colors, ok)

Oh, no, the lake is drying up; add some water, Daddy, quick!
(see the trench.....this was some serious craftsmanship, I tell ya)

Only Anabella would stop to "draw" while walking on the beach! 

And, classic Dan Credle.....found a stick on our walk.
(we didn't walk very far) 

A playground on the beach? Yep.  

Back at the Credles', I had some fun taking pictures before leaving to watch the fireworks at Busch Gardens.

Chip got a kick out of me removing this flag to use it as a photo prop.

Everyone say, "Happy 4th! Mommy is silly!"

Anabella loves flowers; MaMa picked this one for her to hold.

Later that night, we watched fireworks across from Busch Gardens.
The night before, we were inside Busch Gardens, but with all the
trees, we had a better view outside the park.

Here's Anabella with the butterfly light up wand that PaPa and MaMa
bought her the night before when we were inside the park.

Dan picked out a sword that lights up.

The fireworks display at Busch Gardens was fabulous! And, if you can even believe it, we drove all the back to Gainesville that night. The first of what would be several late night drives to get to and from our destinations in July.  Why waste time sleeping when you only have a month of vacation?! (no, really, we prefer to drive at night.  You spend a few hours in the car with two 3 year olds and you'd take peace & quiet over sleep, too, I bet!)