A Weekend of Explosives

 Last weekend we headed to my father's house for the yearly

gingerbread house party.

Normally, the gingerbread houses are made one day

and destroyed weeks later, but this year -in the name of efficiency-,

it was decided that they would be made and destroyed the same night.

The theme for this year's houses: FEMA trailers.

The destruction method: Blow up via fireworks.

 Here is a close-up of Orin's masterpiece.

He certainly won the award for "most candy used"

(Not all of the candy made it to the house, of course,

please note the rather large lump in his cheek and the

"is anyone watching this??!!" look on his face)

 My sister Sarah, her husband Clay, and their son Dylan

were there for the festivities

which marks the first time Casey

has gotten to hang out with his New Hampshire in-laws

and the first time the cousins have met as well.

 

 My brother, having just returned from a tour in Afghanistan,

was also in attendance, as were my step brothers Nate and Josh.

 Put simply, there were a lot of people there with a keen interest 

in pyrotechnics... it was bound to be an unusual evening. 

I am not going to bother to go into the full details of the night.

Let me just say that there was a point where I was 

watching Clay try to rig a roman candle 

on a birdhouse so that it would 

go off and ignite a FEMA trailer

that Nate was dousing with some form of cheap liquor

(while diverting a good deal for consumption)

as Dylan ran around the porch with sparklers.

  

In the morning, all that was left was a patch of charred dirt

and maybe, for some of the participants, a massive headache.

The next day the party toned down a bit with the arrival of

Auntie Robbi and her three children.

Orin, Alden, and Kato had a blast as usual

and posed unexpectedly for this adorable picture.

(Sorry for the lack of color, taking pictures

into the sun with a cheap camera is a bad idea...

black and white was the only way to save it)

 After everyone else left,

we had a little quiet time that we used to go on a hike

through Hopkins Forest. 

The sugar maple sap was running fast

and had nearly filled the collection pails for maple syrup.

Here, Orin and Casey are heading out to check

one of the pails

(you can just see it to the right of Casey's elbow)

It was a fantastic weekend.

Hope yours was great too!