I like Independence Day for a lot of reasons. I'm into history. I LOVE America's history and especially, America's Heritage. It's almost more than I can take, how much I love this country. But I also like Independence Day for the sense of community. I love going out and seeing everybody in their red, white, and blue t-shirts. I love being part of a crowd that gathers for fireworks -- and I HATE crowds. I love Fourth of July parades and wish there was one I could attend close by here. I'm always trying to teach the children on Independence Day, making them read the Declaration of Independence, reading them the preamble to the Constitution and so forth. Also speaking disparagingly about other, lamer countries, like 1776 Great Britain, no offense to current Brits.
So, in addition to the gifts Dorothy brought, several other things made it an awesome Independence Day. Here are some highlights:
Jules and I both sported the "Old Glory" toenail job I perfected years ago. What a privilege to have a daughter big enough to sit still and let the paint dry...and get patriotic with me!
I'm not very good at photographically documenting events. I took a picture of Seth and Scott trying out the cot we put up. If you don't have a hammock, a jumbo-size cot is the next best thing for chillin' in the shade.
There was a complete fireworks ban in Aurora this year, thanks to dry conditions and wildfires. Even the city of Aurora had to cancel its fireworks display. To compensate, we had pretty good substitutes. I spent more than 50 bucks on glow-stuff, which we cracked open and distributed after dark. Then to simulate the firework sounds, we blew up several dozen balloons, which we then popped like crazy during glowstick time.
When I was growing up, my dad called these "Grasshoppers," as in, "Look kids! There's a grasshopper!!" [bang!] I guess some people call them bang-snaps. Whatever you call them, they were freely available for purchase at the Dollar Tree and are therefore not fireworks. I got 15 double-packages of these and we went crazy on it! It's really fun to chuck a big handful of these up in the air with wild abandon and then enjoy the rapid-fire, nearly firecracker-like sound and small flash.
This year's Independence Day party may have been more fun than a real-fireworks time. We only go to the big shows periodically, and then have a terrible time fighting traffic all the way home. There was no traffic this year, tons of sody pop, no worry about whether the ground flowers were going to go off, or whether the tank fireworks were going to drive forward, dribble out a tiny spark and then die. I dare say, all 17 children had a great time, and our nation's Independence and resultant Freedoms were appropriately celebrated.
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