Football on the 4th

Initially, there weren't any All-Star games planned for Saturday, so we asked some of our friends to come over for food and games. Then Kyle was supposed to play on Saturday after all, so we called them all back and cancelled. Then a storm rolled in and the games were postponed until today. We called them all back again and said, "Come on over!" So they did. We had a minor feast spread out, there were 16 kids in various forms of play, 8 adults feeling outnumbered by the kids, boardgames and fireworks were brought out, and most importantly, there was football.

Nathan, Jack, Josh and Matt started warming up before everybody else got here. It was the "young" ones vs the "old" ones.

I think my old one and young one were each surprised by each other's strength.

A lot of times I shoot, and just hold the shutter open to get 6 shots in a frame to capture the action. It means I get some unusual shots sometimes, especially when things happen so fast your eyes can't keep up with everything. This is one of those shots. Things look potentially painful in this shot, but neither one can remember this moment now.

There was a lot of smack being thrown around out there. Some of it was deserved.

There was some showboating going on too. I am not sure all of that was deserved.

After Slade and Brandy arrived, the guys wanted the gals to play too. Then they immediately called for "Skins and Shirts" and tried to call "shirts." We told them it was tackle football, not flappy football, so "skins" was out of the question.

Mystery and I were able to play, while Brandy took care of her baby and Crystal (married to Nathan) took my camera and was the photographer. Mystery was trying to distract me from my quarterbacking duties in this shot.

Here are all 8 of us running after someone who had the ball again. All of us "old" ones should be physically recovered enough from our football injuries in time to play again next July 4th. I just want to mention that in my day to day life I take a lot of pictures. Sometimes I take a few hundred in a really busy day. However, Crystal (married to Nathan) has me beat for sheer picture taking volume, hands down. She took over 1200 (that is not a typo) pictures in the time it took our team to beat Matt and Jack's team. That is some impressive picture taking!

During our feast, Nathan and Crystal's little girl sang "Open the Eyes of my Heart, Lord" to us.

Nothing is as cute as being serenaded by a pre-schooler.

It was a good day. After the football games were over we set off our collective fireworks and then watched the neighbors shoot theirs off. Afterwards a mean round of Cranium WOW was played, where the guys actually won. Happy Birthday, America. It was a lot of fun enjoying our independence today!