Another party? For me?!?!!!

 So here's what happened....I realized that I celebrated my birthday week, the wrong week!  WHAT?  Well, my birthday was on Sunday, which is the beginning of a new week...so.....time for another party?

 Just kidding...sort of...here's the real story.  My Sister's, in-laws were visiting, and remember the guys I used to babysit...well they are 'family' and wanted to get together for my birthday.  We invited them to the concert (we invite them to almost everything, they are just very busy and cannot always attend.  And did I tell you, the younger one, a freshman in high school this year, called me the other day and we talked for two hours!  He was visiting family out of state for the month and I think he was homesick, or very bored, but how very special that he called me!)  Oh yeah....I was telling you the real story...so in-laws visiting...kids I watch... family... wanted to celebrate birthday... so my sister and I were talking about one of us having a cook-out and combining both cook-out for in-laws and birthday with the boys.  The guys wanted to shoot guns for the 4th so we were chosen to have the cook-out.  We have an area where they can shoot.

 So I did a little bit of decorating outside for the party.   Someday I will make some bunting out of material ...maybe when I'm not building a house, or moving, or .......anyway, dollar store had to do for this year.

 But I did make star shaped ice cubes.  However, we didn't use pitchers so they went unnoticed. We used a big tub with a spigot especially made for drinks and I made several batches of iced tea.

 Vickie made bologna cake!  Yup..that's bologna.  The yellow is cheese in a can. Bologna and cheese in a can.  I never buy it.  My Shug was in heaven.  We'll call it a processed food cake!!! Gone by the end of the evening.

 Vickie also came over early and helped me finish getting ready for the party.  I always have last minute things that seem to put me behind.  We had a few extra people decide to come at the last minute, so we sent her husband to the store for some extra brats.  We had chicken kabobs, hot dogs, chicken drumsticks, and brats.  A nice mix of food for the mix of people.

 Vickie and I had an assembly line going for the kabobs, but then I got side-tracked with other duties so she finished up.

 Dixie is wondering what in the "H" is going on out here?

 Across the road the guys were shooting their guns and having a blast.  I called them twice, and told them we were getting hungry.  Finally, I just told them we were eating and to come over when they get hungry! 

 Finally, everyone trickled back over to eat some dinner.

 See the guy in the blue shirt and the guy in the black shirt beside him.  Those are the boys I used to babysit peeps!

 What's this? 

 

 A birthday cake?

 For me?

 They were laughing about how if you put ALL of the candles on the cake you'd have to call the fire department.....something like that....they were cracking themselves up.... at my expense!

 Peeps, this cake was huge!  Look at the inside....and it came from J. Edwards.  You've heard me talk about J. Edwards cakes.  They are absolutely wonderful.  Delicious. Rich.  Yummy.  You must have one.

My sister told me to freeze the leftovers and save them for her birthday!  I had to freeze them like this because I didn't have a container big enough to freeze them upright.

 Here you see a couple of people eating "adult" cupcakes.  Ashley made them, and it appears I did not get a pic of Ashley, or a close-up of the cupcakes.  She even piped on the icing!  She made these cupcakes with these white chocolate edible shot glasses that are actually sunk into the top of the cupcakes, and the shot glasses had a watermelon drink in them.  This watermelon drink was for adults only.

 And Andrew made peanut butter pie!  He made it!  Someone asked him the ingredients.  Oh my gosh was this pie rich and delicious.

 Isn't he cute?

Afterwards everyone sat around chatting,

several played a rousing game of croquet

  (sorry about the blurry picture)   I have a question for you.  When you play(ed) croquet, do you play that the first one that gets to the end is the winner.  Or do you play that when you get to the end, you are now 'poison', and the poison balls tap the other balls to get them out of the game.  The last 'poison' ball standing is the winner. How do you play?  My Sister won, by the way.

 The kids play frisbee

 and ate watermelon, and caught lightening bugs (didn't get a picture of the lightening bugs though)

 And then we had fireworks.  Lots and lots of fireworks.  I've said this before...I LOVE fireworks.  I LOVE the 4th of July.  It is one of my favorite holidays.  I love history and patriotism and our country.  I love summer and cookouts and family/friend gatherings.  And I love going to sleep at night on the 4th and listening to the booms and bangs of fireworks going off.  I just do. 

 But there was this one firework that the guys shot off that I told them NO more.  The empty shell (whatever you call it) would come falling down haphazardly and I was afraid it was going to poke someone's eye out!  If you look closer at this picture.....

 you can see everyone laughing.  They are laughing because they shot off another one, even after I said not to.

  

(sorry - another blurry)Travis is like....."what?......what did I do."  He knew what he did.  When I told them no more, he said, "just one more?"  I said no....they did not listen!  No one got hurt though.  We were very careful with the fireworks...shooting them off from the scaffolding at the end of the walkout.  Everyone was made to stay on the patio area while shooting off fireworks.

 I got to turn on my party lights!

 And at one point during the night, all of my nieces and my nephew were by me and my sister said, "stay right there...everyone...let's get a picture."  You see peeps, I don't have my own children, but I have these kids, and I have the boys that I watched...THEY are my children.   So, my Sister was getting a picture of me with "My" children, and look right between me and my niece, Adrienne.....

VICKIE!!!!  She cracked herself up....she was laughing so hard!

 Anyway, a good time was had by all...I hope. They were talking about next year's party!  Maybe I can get that bunting done this winter.  Jasmine says Goodnight everyone, and Happy Birthday America!

 Cindy Bee