Oh Say, Can You See . . .

There is nothing better than a small-town 4th of July.

Micah, Emma & Adana - walking up to the parade.


Watching the parade - white picket fence in the background - you can't get much more American than this! :-)

Micah skated with the Bainbridge Island Roller Hockey League. They looked HOT - and I'm not just talking about how bad they were sweating. These kids are awesome skaters!

You know you're watching a Bainbridge Island parade when these are the goodies that are thrown out to the crowd. I'm not sure what the plant starts are, but Adana made us hurry home to plant them with her marigolds. And a garlic bulb? Just what every kid wants! We also got reusable grocery totes, bottles of sun screen, and bars of soap. And, of course, about 10 pounds of candy.

While we were walking downtown, this group was in front of us. Adana pulled my head down to hers and whispered in my ear, "They're blubs!" That's her word for anyone who bugs her. I don't know why she was bugged, but I thought it was hilarious.

Micah really got in the spirit of the day. He used washable marker. He then proceeded to get in a major water gun fight with some of the cute girls in our neighborhood, so his flag was soon dripping down his face.

This picture is lousy, but it was the only one I was able to get before my battery died. The kids in our neighborhood do a parade every 4th of July. It's another great tradition that makes us love living here. (That's Micah leading the pack on his roller blades.)

After the neighborhood parade, we went over to a friend's house for a BBQ. I don't even like to think about how much soda my kids drank. Bleck. But I love this shot of Adana and her best little friend, Timmy.

The dads. Don't be fooled. These 3 may look benign, but they are trouble makers! And you should've seen them JUMP when a couple bottle rockets went bizerk and started flying around underneath their chairs later in the evening. :-)

There was a firework free-for-all in the cul-de-sac that evening. It was horrible. I hate unsupervised, uncontrolled fireworks. I think I developed an ulcer trying to keep Adana from getting blown up.

If I had may way, the only fireworks allowed would be smoke bombs, snakes, and sparklers. And maybe a couple of those parachute blasters for a bit of excitement.

Of course, even a sparkler can be dangerous when Adana gets ahold of it, as my friend Gayle discovered. She was so sweet to just sit on the curb all evening and light sparklers - one after the other - for Adana, to keep her out of the way of the bigger stuff.

We ended the day by walking down to Eagle Harbor to watch the HUGE fireworks display over the water. I didn't get any pictures of that, but here is a cute one of 3 of my sun-kissed, sweaty, tired kids as they waited for the show to begin.

I hope you all had a wonderful, safe Independence Day. And I hope you had the chance to stop and think about how very fortunate we are to live in this great nation. God bless America!