independence day…and beyond

I’m a midwest gal and grew up on marshmellowy, fruit salad goodness. The girls like to ask about my childhood and this fruit salad my mom makes came to mind. We went to the grocery store and got the ingredients and it was a fabulous blast from the past. 

We were impatiently eagerly awaiting our friends’ arrival for the weekend so we went to look at houses (more on that later, maybe) and then stopped in for a snack and beverage at Lazy Dog. B ordered the star spangled margarita and took one sip of that syrupy sweet treat. It looked pretty!

Finally, our friend arrived from Missouri! We were so excited to see them. We were able to visit, have dinner at our house and then head downtown to see the Lacrosse game. I’m not a huge fan of lacrosse, but they have the  most amazing firework show after the game. We joined our friends The Tylers, Gus, and Misti for a fun evening. I can’t take my camera in to the game and I’m not good about taking pictures with my phone so I was only able to capture a few…

First time trying cotton candy. Now, that’s a vacation!
The next day we grabbed lunch at Oscar Blues  and the girls were so sad to say goodbye to Felix. They had such a fun visit. It was great to catch up with our friends, Erica and Curtis too and I hope that we will be able to get out to visit them much sooner than later! 

The rest of our day was filled with friends. I had hoped to get some work done but the girls each had a friend over and the house was filled with fun and laughter which is the absolute best kind of distraction.

Annabelle has been asking to hang out with her friend Olivia all summer and were were finally able to make it work. These two fall right back into their friendship even after spending so much time apart. I adore them!

Gwyneth and Ella. Such sweet little souls. 

They talked me into a trip to the pool. I’m a sucker for these girls. There’s no doubt about that.

Gwyneth and Ella switched up their bathing suits. They had us cracking up and were quite pleased with themselves.

Swimming with the mermaids…as one does!