Our Fourth of July was full.  After a breakfast of coffee and cinnamon rolls (mostly for the kids) we went to nearby Harrisburg for their annual parade.  Harrisburg is a small, one traffic light, farming town, and they put on a fun parade every year as well as a spectacular fireworks show along the river at night!  We’ve been attending for 15 years and it never gets old!  This year, we invited our friend Mike to join us, as he had never been to this particular event.

These are the faces that say, “Even though I’m a teenager, I’d love to have some candy thrown my way”

My kids are teenagers now, but a parade is still entertaining.  My daughter is still prone to run out into the street and pick up the candy thrown from the floats.  She’s also prone to picking it up and giving it to a small child who may have not seen the candy or wasn’t quick enough.    She’s a good girl.  We’ll keep her!

My son, is more interested in the vehicles that are driven through the parade.  This year, he was mostly interested in all of the emergency vehicles and what would happen if there was an emergency while they were in the parade.  Good question!

Antique machinery is always amazing, especially when it still works

After our morning at the parade, we drove back home for lunch, and the annual viewing of “Independence Day”.   It’s the traditional movie of the holiday at our house.  When we saw it for the first time, I was 8 months pregnant with our first child.   I don’t think she liked the movie back then.  It was a loud and intense movie, and she moved around a lot.  Now, she’s nearly 17 and wasn’t that interested in seeing it in person.

In the evening, I made a couple of pizzas for us to feast on while sitting along the waterfront in Harrisburg.   Bringing a pizza to the fireworks show is another tradition for this holiday.  After watching “Independence Day” 17 years ago, we went back to our spot for the fireworks show, and Kevin and the friends who were with us at the time, thought that a pizza would be nice and wondered if the local parlour would deliver to someone literally sitting in a field.  So the guys called in an order and within 30 minutes, a pizza delivery truck pulled up to the edge of the field.  I felt kind of bad for the other spectators there, as they started to gather around the truck thinking that this popular restaurant was bringing hot pizzas to sell.   They were rather disappointed when they were told that they needed to place an order for the truck to come back.

While we waiting for darkness, we walked along the waterfront, stopping to talk to people we knew, visit my church’s elephant ear booth, and stop by my friend Debbie’s house.   It’s been a long time since we’ve seen each other in person, and since our kids have seen each other.  All of the kids have grown taller, which, even though we’ve seen each other’s pictures on Facebook, it’s still a little shocking to see in person.

The evening ended with a spectacular fireworks show.  In about 3o minutes, it was all over and we were back in the car, trying to navigate through snails-pace traffic and a couple of neighborhoods where fireworks were being lit in the middle of the street.    We arrived home rather late, expecting to see our cat, Aslan, hiding behind the toilet (his hiding place when there are loud noises outside).  Instead, he was on top of our fridge.

Maybe he thought that the breadbox would make a better bunker!

Elizabeth 🙂