Fourth of July!

Our Fourth of July was fun and... wet! We had my sister and her family come visit from Iowa and it poured rain most of their visit! Bummer! The Franklin fireworks were even cancelled due to rain and thunderstorms! But of course, when you put 6 cousins together, there is still lots of fun to be had!

My first attempt at decorating the mantel for a holiday. Turned out pretty good! 

We always seem to have rain when visitors come in town so this was our third trip to the indoor gardens at Gaylord Opryland. It's free and always a fun time. 

I loved how Lily was holding Stephen's hand. So sweet. 

We stopped in at the Johnston and Murphy store there to look for some mens shoes and Britney and I made our husbands pose! Haha! (Their names are Jeremy and Merrick. Perfect!)

We also did a quick drive through downtown to see the honky tonks, and we got out during a break in the rain to play at Centennial Park. Of course we checked out the Parthenon before hitting the playground.

The kids loved doing a sort of tightrope walk around the exterior of the Parthenon. 

At one point on Thursday I texted my brother Jordan that J&M picture and told him he should drive up from Texas and come hang out with us! Lucky for us he made the 13 hr drive spontaneously!! It was so fun to have him here for a couple days. The kids loved it.

Saturday we drove to the Loveless Cafe. Yum! We got there and it was a two hour wait... So we decided to get take out and it worked out great. 20 mins later we were eating on a damp picnic table outside (it had just stopped raining). 

After we ate we played corn hole with the set they leave out for patrons. 

Then we walked around downtown Franklin, stopped at Sweet Cece's for delicious froyo, and stopped at the church for a little 2 on 2 basketball for the men. 

Britney and I chatted on the stage while they played and then we realized the kids had left and were probably making a mess in the church. We found them in the Relief Society room conducting a meeting. :) 

Precious. They said they were each giving talks on "spying". :) 

In the afternoon we enjoyed the sun that finally came out and took the kids on a walk down to the field of wild flowers in our neighborhood. It was gorgeous.

That night we offered to babysit while Britney and Jeremy went to see Carrie Underwood and others at the Grand Ole Opry show. We made snack necklaces and watched a movie.

Cute cousins! The next day Britney and her family left and Jordan stayed and went to church with us and we walked down to the river with him in the afternoon. It was nice to spend some extra time with him before he had to drive back to Texas. 

Despite the rain our holiday was so fun and we loved having family in town!