Fourth of July!

To start off I hope everyone had a great Fourth of July weekend! We definitely did! Kendall and I were able to make it down to his family's place in the very large town of Menan, ID (population 700, seriously)for the annual under the apple tree celebration. This a very big event in the Crane/Poole family and has been going strong for ten plus years. For those of you who attend you know what I am talking about, but this party is great! Its tradition to get shirts made and change the color each year, this year the shirts were white with and option to tie dye at the tie dye party (my idea on the tie dying a year ago! sadly I didn't get to do my own). The shirts turned out great and there was lots of fun designs and some, even on the little ones! Back to the small town, Kendall's family is about half the population with his mom and dad and grandparents and two aunts all close by each other (walking distance of course). The "apple tree" does in fact exist and believe it or not, produces apples! :) Family and friends come from all over each fourth of July to party and camp out for days sometimes! It really is great, I love family reunions and I have the best in-laws anyone could ask for!

Menan has a parade that is lot of fun and they also have a big place where there are lots of food booths, games, and crafts so it was hard to be bored. It seems to get better each year (this is my second, and a half time)! The best part of the day is the fireworks at night of course, the apple tree area has prime seating for the huge firework show! (Serious, huge show! I have been a veteran of stadium of fire so I have some comparison here!)

Kendall's two brothers have two kids each so I have recently become an aunt and am loving it! They are some of the cutest little ones I have ever seen so I guess that's good news for us someday right?! fingers crossed :) The funny part of the weekend was the new hair cuts for the "Crane sisters" myself included. I recently cut my hair into a short a-line so my sister-in-laws and I all have very similar hair (did I mention dark hair brown eyes too?!) Be careful who you walk up behind boys!!

Our cousin Melissa came for the festivities all the way from Arkansas with her brand new baby boy! He was even better than the fireworks! Micah is now 8 weeks old and has a head full of dark hair, such a little man! Melissa is a wonderful little mommy already and I was so happy to spend the weekend with her chatting and talking about her new adventure. I definitely wished we lived closer to her! Hopefully someday.

We were also able to do a little float down the river, or better known as the "dry beds" for those of you who are from the area. We had 23 people go and we each got our own big tire tubs. It was a lot of fun despite the two minor (maybe not so minor if you were involved) incidents. Kyle, Kendall's middle brother cut himself on a rock going through the "rapids" and later on ended up getting stitches, and Danika my sister-in-law had a little bit of a scare when she was thrown off her tube and stuck under the water but Carissa and I were there for the rescue! Sounds traumatic but really its pretty smooth sailing most of the time, so I think it will become a tradition. We are glad they are okay though!!