Our July 4th

What a great day we had yesterday!!  Myron had the day off at Chromalox, but had to work a full day shift at Wally World, which was too bad, but those of us at home had a lovely day.  First we got up and ready for the parade!  Sunscreen on, ice water at the ready, we drove to the closest parking spot and walked to the parade route while the fire trucks, with their sirens blaring, drove by to mark the beginning of the parade.  I was glad we were still on the way when that happened, as Ozzy hates all the noise from those sirens.  With that done by the time we got to the parade route, Austin enjoyed the rest of the parade without incident.  Every time he caught a piece of candy or got a flyer from someone in the parade, he turned around to say, "Hey, Mom!  Look!"  Big grin, happy boy.  Justin was more passive, watching from his seat on the curb (and part-time seating in the chair a nearby person had opted out of).  Still, he was excited with the goings-on and happy to be there.  Nearly 90  minutes later, we were walking into the grocery store to buy some snaps, those little fireworks that the kids throw and pop on the ground.   Home again, the boys took to throwing snaps outside, and Levi and I sat on my bed watching tv while I stretched my arm for a while in my aircast brace. 

   This was just a couple of days after the aircast had been delivered, and I had followed the instructions to learn how to use it.  Turned out I was wearing it backward, but it still worked, just less conveniently.  Thank you to my physical therapist for setting me straight today!!   I've got plenty of work to do with this elbow, but it's going well.  Slow and steady, but it will be better with the new brace.  A big thank you should also go out to the guy who sold me the brace on ebay for about ten percent of the price listed on the aircast website!! 


After some solid arm stretching, Levi and I wended our way into the kitchen, where I made a pasta salad and a potato salad which I left chilling while I cooked hamburgers and hot dogs for our lunch/dinner.  We feasted on burgers and dogs with salads and chips and peanut butter cookies with Hershey kisses on them for dessert.  Heather came home from her activities just in time to fix up a plate and join us for lunch, which was rather awesome timing!!  It's prettty unusual to have all the kids here for a meal these days! 

Levi had to work at 5:00 and Myron got home from work at 6:00, a bit like ships passing in the night.  Myron took a nap and we walked to the high school for fireworks.  The live music was very fun, and when they finished their program, a flash mob-style performance began on the bleachers on one side of the football field, which culminated in the opening of an enormous U.S. flag and the singing of the national anthem by the a capella group who had been performing earlier.  The last notes hung in the air, then all the lights went out at once and the fireworks commenced.  It was pretty cool.  We had a great Independence Day.