Enjoying summer… celebrating Independence Day

(Thought I would share pictures of some our patriotic décor and food from the weekend.)

I hope you enjoyed celebrating Independence Day weekend  We did. :)

We had a gathering with friends and saw a firework display on Friday night.

Then I picked blueberries with my adorable nieces on Saturday.  And took them coupon shopping with me (gotta train them young!) – they pushed their own mini carts, filled them with food, and even gave the cashier their own coupons! :)

The nieces helped me make yummy desserts for Sunday using our freshly picked blueberries.

Red, white, and blue triffle – recipe found here.

and a Patriotic version of fruit pizza – recipe here. 

Sunday brought a picnic after church and another firework display in the evening.

My husband was actually off on 4th of July, which gave us a 2-day weekend – yay!  ( He works every Saturday so no long weekends for us usually.)

We had friends over for games in the afternoon. 

(My patriotic summer mantel.)

And planned to join in some of the local festivities in the evening.

But it rained on and off throughout the afternoon and evening, so my husband and I just opted to have a quiet movie/game night at home.

I made country style BBQ ribs in the oven, with smashed potatoes and peas.

And then I was inspired by this picture and recipe on Pinterest.  Doesn’t that look delicious??!!

And decided to make my own mini version for dessert! :)

(I just made my favorite chocolate chip cookie recipe, baked it in mini springform pans, and topped with vanilla ice cream and chocolate syrup.)

    

I think we had more fun just staying home together, than trying to fight the crowds to watch noisy fireworks (we had already seen two fireworks displays on Friday and Sunday night anyways.)

We’ll have to remember to do that more of that this summer instead spending money running around to different events. 

How did you spend your 4th of July weekend?

Happy Summer!