4th of July Photo's

 He was a bit scared of the fireworks.

 Our fireworks. We should have waited until it was completely dark to do them.

 Ha.

A quick video of another evening of fireworks. Everyone walked away uninjured. For the most part. I think my favorite part of the evening was when something landed on Rich's foot and all we could see was his foot dancing around with something on fire on it. HA! Too bad I didn't get THAT on video.

The Package... & a Side Note

Well here it is.. Everything that my mom & I sent to my brother & his companion...

A photo album, soft flag balls, pine cones, vitamins, quinoa, jennies cookies, Hershey bars, beef jerky, paddle balls, Utah truffles, random 4 of July stuff, kool aide, honey sticks & Instant breakfasts = 6 lbs. $41.09 later, its in the mail. Ridiculous. Hopefully he will be getting all of this before the 4th.

**A message to my neighbors... I don't know who you are but I know your car.. If your car alarm goes off, at least twice, at the same time everyday there is something wrong with your CAR.... It was funny the first week... But now, months later - its not funny anymore. Just annoying. Maybe you should look into getting that fixed.

July Crafts

Since Independence day is only a couple weeks away Amir and I painted some pine cones red white and blue. There is a HUGE tree by my moms house that drops a bunch of pine cones so we gathered up a few on our last visit. Then we just used some washable paint to color them. Amir really loves to paint. I think I can safely say its one of his top 3 things to do. The other two being playing in water (IN THE HOUSE AND OUTSIDE!) & digging in the dirt. :)


We are sending these pine cones to my brother (the one on a mission) and his current companion for the fourth of July. We made them just in time because we are sending him a package tomorrow!


One more thing... I've been sending Sami weekly emails & I finally got a personal response yesterday... it said: "I miss Amir!" THAT WAS IT! Ha ha ha. He's a funny guy. :P

Independence Day (2009)

I think the 4th of July has to be one of my favorite holidays. When else could you light things on fire and watch them explode? This year we went to No. Salt Lake's fireworks. It was AWESOME! I didn't take any pictures of the actual fireworks but here are a few before it got dark. We were so close that there was ash falling down near us. They were some of the biggest fireworks I have ever seen. Probably because we were so close.

[Amir walking around the golf course waiting for fireworks.]

[View]

Thats right, it was COLD. We all curled up in blankets to keep warm. Amir was a little scared of the fireworks at first but by the end he was asking for more.

This is a video of Amir's reactions when we were doing our own fireworks.

Independence Day

Yesterday during all of the festivities I started to wonder: "When did people start actually using fireworks to celebrate the 4th?"
My first thought was to text "CHACHA" because so far they haven't failed to answer any of my previous questions to my satisfaction. But this time, I was very disappoint. I asked them the question specifically to the 4th of July and they came back with a lame answer that involved China. Yes, we all know that they have been using fireworks for the past 2,000 or so years. But that was NOT my question. Not once in my question did I mention China. So to my disappointment I had to look elsewhere.
Where you ask? Google. They never seem to fail me. Although usually I do always come across something even better on the path for answers to my sometimes odd questions.
The first thing I typed into the Google search bar was simple: "Independence Day". One of the first places it directed me to was Wikipedia. Another great site that has all the answers. What I found on this site at first was not an answer to my initial question to CHACHA but I did find some interesting facts.

Some of which were:

In 1778, General George Washington marked July 4 with a double ration of rum for his soldiers and an artillery salute. Across the Atlantic Ocean, ambassadors John Adams and Benjamin Franklin held a dinner for their fellow Americans in Paris, France.

In 1779, July 4 fell on a Sunday. The holiday was celebrated on Monday, July 5.

In 1783, Moravians in Salem, North Carolina, held the first celebration of July 4 in the country with a challenging music program assembled by Johann Friedrich Peter. This work was titled "The Psalm of Joy".

In 1791 was the first recorded use of the name "Independence Day".

In 1870, the U.S. Congress made Independence Day an unpaid holiday for federal employees.

In 1931, Congress changed Independence Day to a paid federal holiday. The residents of Vicksburg, Mississippi, celebrated Independence Day for the first time since July 4, 1863, when the Siege of Vicksburg ended with a Union victory during the American Civil War.

I later found that fireworks started being used in 1777, one year after the Declaration of Independence was signed on July 4, 1776.

I also found that America's Freedom Festival at Provo, in Utah, is one of the largest freedom festivals. It includes one of the largest Independence Day parades, and the Stadium of Fire.