Fourth Festivities

In keeping with our family tradition, this 4th of July holiday was marked by a visit from Chad's grandmother Margie from Salina. Chad had a meeting in Smolan on Monday night, so it worked out perfectly for him to stay the night with Grandma and bring her back to Lawrence the next day. She and Chad played cards in the afternoon, and on Tuesday night we took her out to the softball fields to watch Chad's double header. Both games were very exciting battles against the best team in their league, and the second game even went into extra innings.

On Wednesday we were able to sleep in a little, which was a great way to start a vacation day. Chad and Grandma played some more cards, and then early in the afternoon Mom and Cliff came over from Topeka to do some holiday hanging as well. We were forced into the basement for a little while because of the tornado sirens, so we watched a little TV before coming back upstairs to watch the rain. Mom brought her famous squash blossoms, which she fried up to perfection for a decadent appetizer in the early evening. Later Chad grilled us turkey brats, served with his famous homemade mustard. We followed up dinner with some angel food cake topped with strawberries and whipped cream.

Mom and Cliff had to head home after dinner, since Mom had to commute to Emporia early in the morning. Grandma and Chad and I, along with Celtic and Hope, crawled into the car and headed over to Baldwin City, a tiny town about 30 minutes away. Our friends had suggested this was a good place to watch fireworks for Grandma, since we could pull right up into the parking lot of the high school where the display is launched, and Grandma wouldn't have to do any walking at all. Even though we got there just minutes before the show started, it was really the perfect location for us. We sat our chairs right outside the car so Grandma only had to take about two steps before sitting down to enjoy the show! Not only that, but the show was less than 100 yards from us, which meant the fireworks were almost directly overhead. It was a little bit loud, especially for Hope, who chose to stay in the car (I stayed there with her to offer some comfort), but it was really awesome for the rest of us to be that close! Since Baldwin is such a small town, it wasn't an especially long show, which I thought was actually kind of nice since I think fireworks tend to get kind of monotonous. This was the perfect length and the perfect distance. Grandma said it was the best fireworks show she'd ever seen! I can't believe I forgot to bring the camera!

Thursday morning we drove Grandma back to Salina and stopped briefly to visit Chad's parents while were there. While it was a really quick visit with Grandma, we had a really nice time and were very thankful that we were able to continue our 4th of July tradition!