July 4th and Cousinpalooza

We were so excited to celebrate July 4th in the states this year!  For Jack & Kara it was their first July 4th celebration, and for Ainsley it was the first one she is old enough to remember.  We decided to celebrate with family that we hadn't seen in several years, which meant lots of cousins for the kids to play with.  We drove (to save money) and first drove from Austin to Argyle to pick up Kevin (my brother) and his three kids (they rode in Pa's car).  Then we all drove to Shawnee, OK to visit Grand Nan (my grandmother), Aunt Jona and Beverly, and cousin Melissa.  We went to an old favorite of ours in downtown Shawnee -- Hamburger King.

Notice the phone at the booth, it is used to call in the orders.  This was my favorite feature of the restaurant when I was a kid :-)

My brother and I used to go to Hamburger King with my grandmother when we were kids, so we have a lot of memories ... the inside looks exactly the same!

Back at Grand Nan's house:

at IHOP the next morning, Grand Nan and her great grandkids (Jack, McKenzie, Kara, Grand Nan, Ainsley, Mason, Maddie):

We then continued our journey and drove to Broken Arrow, OK (just outside of Tulsa).  Aunt Karen (dad's sister) hosted a huge family get-together that included my dad's side of the family.  The kids had nine other little cousins to play with and had a BLAST.  Some of the highlights...

Baseball game in Tulsa with the cousins:

Fireworks after the game, we watched from the parking lot:

The kids watching the fireworks:

Water balloons!

Jack persuaded many o' people to play baseball with him...for hours...

 Water balloon volley ball:

Homemade ice cream!

Swimming at the neighborhood pool:

Aunt Karen gave lots of golf cart rides to the kids:

The kid cousins:

 

 The grown up cousins (Kevin, Kim, Stephanie, Kyle), aka parents to the 12 kids in the previous picture :-)

One of the reasons we decided to move back to the states was to give our kids a chance to be close to family, and this weekend warmed our hearts.  They enjoyed little things like buying snacks at gas stations, staying in a hotel, getting to stay up later than usual, playing for hours and hours with cousins, and being around family.  There were so many moments that Matt and I just smiled, on the outside and inside, because we saw pure joy in our kids eyes.  The drive back to Austin was ~8 1/2 hours, but the kids did great.  It was a fantastic vacation -- a good time had by all!