Look Mom! An Entrance Into Heaven!

Happy Independence Day to all of my faithful family, friends and bloggers! I love holidays, and especially enjoy sharing old family traditions with my children. Today was no different. We BBQ'd and played all day. We ate traditional Jones 4th food ... BBQ'd then slowly baked pork butt steaks, baked beans, devilled eggs, corn on the cob, misc other sides and then topped it all off with a dutch apple pie, real whipped cream (not the junk from a tub) and multiple flavors of ice cream. THIS is why we are Americans! Freedom of Food Choice!

Anticipating a day of rain, the kids and I spent a bit of time last night at Grandpa's house lighting sparklers and watching some silly spinner firecrackers. I've never allowed my kids to do this ... simply out of fear one would be hurt, but this year I spent a couple of 10 spots at the fireworks tent in West Alton on the basics. I didn't even do bottle rockets. I'm such a stodgy old mom.

Tonight I packed up the kids and headed out to our traditional patch of lawn at our old church to watch Florissant's fireworks display. We had an hour to kill before the display finally started, so the kids had fun running around in the grass, playing with their glow sticks and just being kids (kids who were overtired and giddy with excitement about the fireworks!) Although it was terribly overcast, there was a brief moment when the clouds parted and you could see a light circle in the dark sky that was obviously a full moon, but to Isaac's eye it was something quite different. He said softly, "Look, Mom! An entrance into heaven! I wish I could jump up there and be with Grandma. Do you think she's watching through the heaven window?" That got me right in the gut. It had already been a tough day emotionally due to other circumstances ... but Isaac's comment had me in tears. I miss her too.

Anyway, in the middle of the display Brandon turned to me and smiled ... his mouth was GLOWING. This is where I totally freaked. He had bitten into his glow stick! Fortunately the church had water and popcorn for the 4th of July revelers so we did an emergency rinse and spit. Now I'm having second thoughts, questioning myself as to whether or not I should have taken him to the ER. Guess I'm a bad mom.

So that was our day. I hope yours was equally blessed!

Proud to Be An American,

Kathy