Happy Independence Day!

Our Independence Day celebrations were pretty small this year. Dave had to work til 7:30 patrolling the river. When he got home, we had chicken on the grill, baked beans, macaroni salad and fruit salad for dinner, then headed down to the beach for the town's fireworks.

We managed to find a spot that wasn't terribly crowded--one of the perils of living in a tourist town, we are learning, is CROWDS--and settled down to do some sparklers of our own before the firework show.

It has been SO hot and SOOOOO humid lately that our sparklers were a little damp and it took quite a bit of encouragement for them to actually light. 

I thought Jed would be afraid of the sparklers but he really enjoyed them. I think his favorite part was throwing them down emphatically on the sand and stomping on them once they were done to make sure they were out.

In his heart of hearts, though, his favorite part of the night was the big crane. The town is building an observation and fishing pier on the beach and the crane is part of the construction. Jed was thrilled we were so close to it.

Dave had a good time with the sparklers too!

I loved sitting on the beach to watch the fireworks because we could see them all up and down the lake shore. Michigan has just passed some new legislation that allows the average Joe to buy the BIG fireworks and lots of people were enjoying that privilege to the max. In the above picture, the big firework higher in the sky is from some people who were sitting not too far from us and the smaller green one in the distance is from the town of Harrisville, about 15 miles up the shore road. The Harrisville fireworks kept going steadily for about 45 minutes.

The fireworks were spectacular, but my favorite thing we saw last night was the moonrise. It rose through all the accumulated smoke and was so brilliantly red. 

As it got higher in the sky, it got out of the smoke and turned orange. Such a lovely reminder that sometimes nature produces the best fireworks display of all.  

Even though our celebrations of the Fourth were fairly tame, it was nice to be out of the house together, enjoying the breeze off the lake and thinking about how blessed we are to live in America. I love our country and I'm so grateful for our Founding Fathers' vision of how great it could be, and I hope I can have the courage to defend that vision. I'm grateful for those I know and love, and those I don't, who have sacrificed and served in the armed forces to defend our freedom. Happy Independence Day!