Happy Fourth of July!

Happy birthday, America!

Our celebration was a little disjointed, but we had fun.

Yesterday at work was really rough for me. Monday holidays are okay, and Thursday or Friday holidays are okay. But holidays that fall on a Tuesday or Wednesday just wreak havoc. It throws off all our deadlines. We had to work so hard on Monday and Tuesday of this week, I told Jeff that I'd almost rather go ahead and work today.

When I finally got done with work yesterday evening, Jeff, Biscuit and I decided to go to a baseball game. It was hot, but it was a nice way to wind down and relax.

Before the game started, two guys laid out this big X on the field behind second base. Then the announcer came over the loud speaker and told everyone to look up at the big military plane in the sky. Then two paratroopers came sailing down. They had red smoke sailing out behind them.

And I don't know if you know this, but red is Biscuit's favorite color! I bet those guys used red just for him!

The first two guys landed landed on their feet, and it was really impressive. You could tell they had done that sort of thing once or twice before.

Biscuit was beside himself with excitement. "THEY DID IT, MOM! THEY DID IT! THEY LANDED!"

I was thinking to myself, "They were going to land one way or the other, but I'm really glad they landed on their feet."

Then we looked up to see a third jumper. He came down with an American flag flying behind him, and a really good singer started singing the National Anthem. The timing worked out so that the paratrooper landed at the exact moment the singer finished.

It hadn't occurred to me that when the third paratrooper landed, the flag would hit the ground. But once again, those guys knew what they were doing. The third guy's feet had barely touched the ground when one of the ground team members grab ahold of that flag. It never even came close to touching the ground.

Because the baseball team was going on the road today, the stadium put on a fireworks show last night, so we figured we'd just stay home tonight and skip the crowds at the fireworks show here in town.

We gathered around our TV and watched the Capitol Fourth program on PBS. I think Biscuit liked the TV fireworks better than live ones because he didn't have to cover his ears. Plus, he really likes the marching band music, like John Phillips Souza and those guys.

After the PBS show went off, I started surfing the channels and found more fireworks on another channel. Biscuit had gone into our room to watch cartoons until bedtime, so he was all snuggled into my side of the bed. I went in and changed the channel to the other fireworks.

"More fireworks," I said. "Isn't that cool?"

"Yeah," he said. "But I wanted cartoons." With his little sad face pout.

Biscuit and I did make it downtown this morning for part of the annual Fun Fourth Festival. There's a local band that plays kid music, and I took him to see them. The band used to play regular adult music, but once they had kids, they said they couldn't find any children's music that didn't drive them crazy. So they started writing their own stuff. Their music is really fun, and Biscuit knows a lot of it because we have three of their CDs.

We danced and sang and had a great time, and then I realized how hot it was. I had packed some water for us, so I kept encouraging Biscuit to drink.

"Mom," he whined. "You already made me drink so much water."

"Yes," I said. "And I'll keep making you drink water. When it's this hot, our bodies need water, and the way we give our bodies water is by drinking it. Okay?"

"Okay," he said, but I could tell he wasn't happy with my answer.

I hate to sound like a wuss, but I think the heat got to me. As I was driving us home, I started getting chills and felt a little light-headed. I was glad to get to a red light at one point to gather my bearings and make it the rest of the way home.

When I came in the house, I laid down in the living room floor and relaxed for a little while. Jeff got me some water and turned on the ceiling fan. That was a little scary. I've never felt like that before.

We ordered some pizza for dinner so I wouldn't have to cook.

And right now, we're all playing. Biscuit is cowboy Capt. Griddles, Jeff is a detective (he's wearing a fedora), and I'm Calamity Jane. My Mama told Biscuit that she's Annie Oakley, so Calamity Jane was the only cowgirl I could think of at the time Biscuit who I was. Now, I've been Calamity Jane for about a year.

So our July Fourth might not have been traditional, but it worked for us.

Here are a few pictures:

Black Dagger paratrooper.

The paratroopers had a meet-and-greet after their jump. I got them to sign Biscuit's program. One of them asked to try on his sunglasses, and Biscuit thought that was the coolest thing ever.

The paratroopers handed out stickers. The guy who tried on Biscuit's sunglasses was trying to hand Biscuit two stickers, but Biscuit kept trying to only grab one. Hey, at least my kid isn't greedy!

Biscuit gets his groove on with the band Big Bang Boom.

Biscuit and his friend run under the fountains at the park. Biscuit is in the gray shirt and blue shorts.