Best 4th of July Ever

We met Chris and Olivia in our small group when we living in College Station.  They are some of our closest friends.  When we moved here, they moved closer to Chris' famliy in El Paso.  After months of wanting to plan a visit, and a couple of pregnancies later, we FINALLY reunited.  We flew to El Paso then drove up to Ruidoso to stay at Chris' family's house.

I was nervous about our first flight with Stella.  It went pretty well though.

 We got to El Paso around 6 or 7, then drove to Chris and Olivia's house.  Then, we had a 3 hour drive to Ruidoso.  It made for a long night.  Stella was a trooper.  We stopped for a late night green chili cheese burger on the way...YUM!

 

Ella is absolutely adorable with the kids.  Ella is 2 and Asher is just two days younger than Stella.

 

We finally arrived! In the morning, this is what we woke up to! Beautiful!

I took a million pictures of the kids playing... they did so well together.  Stella and Asher would stare at eachother and laugh and grab eachother.  Ella was the little ring leader.  So sweet!

 On the 4th, we walked around downtown Ruidoso and stopped in to have some appetizers at a little pub.

Daddy's little firecracker.

That night, we went to a small town rodeo to watch the fireworks.  The fireworks never actually happened...but we had fun anyway!

 

 The next day, we went to Lincoln County, where the Lincoln County wars happened and Billy the Kid was caught.  Jarrett has wanted to do this for so long! It was fun.  We had a picnic at a park there.

Ella gave make overs at our picnic.

 

The next day, we tried our luck at Ruidoso downs horse races! Stella is good luck! We won about $70 in just an hour or so.  We left before we spent any of it.

 

 

It was time to head back the next day.  Stella did perfectly.  We played in the airport.  When it was time to get on the airplane, we all slept!    We were so lucky that there was a woman behind us who kept Stella entertained, too!

 

Home Sweet Home!

We had so much fun spending time with Chris and Olivia! We are blessed to have friends like them!

We love you, Duncans!