It came and went. The 4th of July. I can’t believe Summer is MORE than halfway over! This Spring when the kids were home went by ever-so-slowly....but the actual Summer is FLYING! I guess when we were in quarantine and home-schooling and EVERYTHING was shut down is why those 8 weeks moved slow as molasses. But now that it’s hot everyday and pools and parks are open, the Summer is zipping by faster than I can even keep up with. We’ve been in Summer for 8 weeks and we only have 5 1/2 weeks left. Yes, we are so lucky that school ended 2 weeks earlier than normal to add more Summer days, but it actually feels like it’s been a shorter season than normal. I have no idea how that is even possible!
The 4th of July is always a reminder that we’ve reached the peak of Summer and now it’s time to come down. School starts Augusta 13th (YES! They voted on opening as normal!!! WOOOO-HOOO!!!!!) and that is in 38 days! Can you even believe it? Aye-aye-aye!
BUT! The point of this post is to high-light the 4th of July so that’s what I’ll do.
First off, our neighborhood is the PLACE TO BE on July 4th. It is so much fun! It all started out with a 9:30am parade. We were told to decorate bikes, wagons, strollers, anything we wanted in Red, White, and Blue for the parade and the policemen led it, while the firemen were the caboose. The kids loved it! There are like 8,000 kids in our neighborhood so this parade was LEGIT. It’s more like a small city than a neighborhood, to be honest.
Anyway, everyone received popsicles at the end. We then came home and watched the Sandlot (tradition) while I prepped dinner for later (marinades, salsa, guacamole, jello etc.) and then headed down to the pool for a few hours. We played patriotic music and met new neighbors we haven't talked to yet. Almost everyone at the pool was wearing some sort of patriotic swim suit or outfit and everyone was just HAPPY. It was so nice to be surrounded by people who were smiling and being friendly and excited for the night’s festivities. For the first time in a long time we didn’t hear about protests and brutality. We didn’t mention rallies or politics. We were unified in our love for America and just glad to be celebrating. After dinner we did our own fireworks. The kids just love fireworks so there is really no explaining on that. We laughed and squealed and ran around the yard having fun. Suddenly a HUGE pop-up storm moved in and the sky opened up faster than we could even get our fireworks all picked up. It rained for about 20 minutes but it was still so hot outside so instead of going inside to wait it out, we all just danced in the rain. It was the best 20 minutes! All of us just dancing to good songs about America- Shawn and I teaching the kids some dance moves that embarrassed Lucy but had Sully and Piper enthusiastically trying to do themselves. When the rain passed there was a huge beautiful rainbow- it was so perfect for America’s birthday :).
We finished up our fireworks and headed over to one of our neighborhood ponds (we have a lot of them) to watch the firework show. They bought $5,000 worth of huge fireworks. It was AMAZING! It was about 45 minutes long and the order they had them in was definitely well-planned out. It was a just as big as any city fireworks' show and we were able to watch it from such a close distance. Once again, we listened to songs like God Bless the U.S.A., America the Beautiful, The Star Spangled Banner, etc. There was that prideful feeling I seem to get every year when I watch the fireworks' shows. Not the bad kind of pride- but pride in my country. The feeling of love for where I live. Counting my blessings and looking all around me and realizing how grateful I was to be right there, in that moment with good people who love America too. Shawn and I said over and over how glad we were to live where we live- for my kids to get to run around and watch a magnificent firework show with all their friends. Some adult was handing out glo-sticks to them all while they danced around waving for them and played tag and ate red, white and blue treats. Adults were sharing blankets and chairs with whoever needed one. People were laughing and care-free and just enjoying watching the most beautiful fireworks right in front of a HUGE full moon. It was exactly what I needed to lift my spirits a bit after the horrible few months we’ve had across the nation. It was so good to be reminded that we can come together as we celebrate living in the greatest country in the world and we can all love each other no matter what. In all honesty, there hasn’t been much strife in my safe little community of Jenks. We’ve all watched from afar as the country has divided itself (again) and looted and rioted and we have all hung our heads in sadness but not participated in the riff-raff. It’s been terrible. But July 4th was a night we didn’t want to think about any of that.
We wanted to honor the good that remains in this country, pay tribute to all those on the front-lines and show respect for those that fought and died for our freedom. I think we accomplished just that.
