Fourth on the Second

We went to a great Fourth of July celebration last night. We need more Fourth of July parties. I think the Fourth of July should be more like Christmas, where there are parties for at least two weeks before the holiday actually arrives.

Last year the Fourth was miserably humid, but last night was perfect weather. My friend made this fabulous cake - it's a dense white cake with cream cheese frosting with raspberries and blueberries lined up to make an American flag. Beautiful and oh, so good.


Unfortunately, this is the only picture I got, with my camera phone. I remembered to bring the camera, just not the memory card.

After dinner and cake, we walked to the pond behind the house to set off fireworks. By this point, it was way past Boo 's bedtime, but she was hanging in there. There were about 12 older kids there (older than Boo), and when we got to the pond, all the kids huddled over the pond looking at the fish. For a really long time. Who needs fireworks when there are fish swimming around in a pond? Eventually the fireworks got going, and I wished I had brought my video camera. All 12 kids would gather around the firework as it was about to be lit, and then they stampeded back to the blanket to see it go off.

Boo was not as unaffected by the fireworks as she was last year. The first one went off and she about crawled inside my shirt. I think it was a combination of too tired, and unfamiliar. She and I walked back to the car to get her blanket, and it helped to have that around. I told her that the fireworks go "pop", and that made a huge difference in how she felt about them. She LOVES to say "POP"! By the end she was clapping and saying "yay, yay" after each firework. A friend asked me if we were going to see any more fireworks shows, and Boo popped her head up and shook it and said, "No! No! No! NO!"

While I had my arms full of Boo, J had his arms full of boys. Two little guys toddled over to him and sat on his lap for the fireworks show.

We're looking forward to the real fireworks show tomorrow night.