Celebrating The Fourth

I had an absolutely lovely holiday weekend celebrating the Fourth of July! :) Incidentally, it also crossed my mind several times how much I hated this holiday when I was in retail hell. Fourth of July meant mad rushes that cleaned out the shelves, angry customers, backed up lines, and - starting way earlier than it should - extremely drunk people. I didn't have to work on the fourth this year, but even if I had, it wouldn't have compared to that at all lol!

The fun started on Thursday with a "patriotic manicure" session for Abigail, Anna, and I.

Abigail looked through a lot of ideas on my phone and decided she wanted blue polka dots with an American flag on her ring finger and thumb.

 

It took me about half an hour and half a dozen toothpicks, but I made it! She loved it and was actually impressed (which I did not expect from my little perfectionist!).

Anna wanted a dark blue manicure with an American flag on her thumb, and a firework on her ring finger. It turned out pretty well, if I do say so myself!

After doing everyone else's nails, I was done (plus - I have such poor coordination that I can barely paint my own nails, nevermind doing designs on myself). I did a simple red, blue, and white-gold mani and had fun rocking it all weekend! (I got tons of compliments, too! Love it!)

 

I did have to work on Friday, but as soon as I got off I did a mad dash through Wal-Mart to buy drinks and supplies, and that evening Dad, Maggie, and I lugged a cooler of drinks and a huge tray of chocolate covered strawberries to the lawn of St. Mary's College to enjoy the River Concert. Over the day, more and more friends decided to join us, so by the end we were sharing our blanket with Linda, Sam, Ben, Cris, Anna, Mark, and Paulina. People came and went as their schedules allowed, and we had a great time relaxing, eating our strawberries (so. so good.) and enjoying some wonderful music.

 

 

One of my goals this weekend was a trip to the farmer's market to check out the prices and see if I could get better deals on produce (verdict: yes), so on Saturday morning I called Cris to see if she wanted to come along (she did!). We walked around and I snagged a head of romaine lettuce (so much fresher than the supermarket!), mixed red, green, yellow, and orange peppers (5 for $3!), tomatoes, heirloom carrots, and strawberries (not that great a price and nowhere near as good quality as supermarket). I also swung by the Amish stand and snagged a miniature shoefly pie (which was no good - I ate half and ended up giving the rest to dad. I need to make one myself!) and gingerbread (which was amazing!). We also tried the homemade lemonade (which was okay, but not incredible), patted the puppies, and generally enjoyed our little excursion.

 

 

Sunday was a quiet, low-key, much needed day of rest. Breakfast was this omelette, STUFFED with chopped peppers from the market and a sprinkle of extra-sharp cheddar (so, so good!). I worked on cleaning the house with frequent breaks, and got everything pretty squared away by the end of the day.  That evening Maggie and I ordered pizza and watched The Secret Life Of Walter Mitty. (Which we loved after the first two minutes. It's just a beautifully shot film.)