Happy 4th

 Maybe you heard about the crazy freak storm that blew through here last week, knocking out power and igniting a kind of shocked mayhem for millions.  We lost power Friday night, and spent the next few days mooching off friends' and neighbors' air conditioning and hospitality, until our electricity came back on Monday night.  Two days later we are still reeling and recovering.  And extremely grateful for cold water and cold air.

While we are still figuring out how our family wants to celebrate some holidays, 4th of July has been a no-brainer for us ever since we moved here four years ago.  Flag-raising and pancake breakfast at our church, followed by the  best small-town parade ever in our own neighborhood.  Here's Uncle Sam, a.k.a Joe the Irish Painter, who has pained several rooms in our house.

With the very recent power outage, there was a definite theme to the floats this year.  Like this one - there are two power poles strung and the poster says "Barcroft Salutes Dominion."

This one says "Arlington Cooling Center" (there were a lot of announcements about cooling centers over the weekend) and "We Survived Wind-Mageddon."

Here's our personal favorite, and it has nothing to do with our friends driving and our kids shooting spray bottles off the back.

This lady was awesome - she is carrying a huge splintered piece of the power pole that went down in one of the streets in our neighborhood, which was the culprit of many of the outages.  

Channel 7 news was even there, sticking cameras in faces during the parade - here's a clip with a lot of shots of our float - you can even see me around 0:48 but don't blink (top left, blue shirt, taking a picture.)

Adorableness.

After the parade, everyone gathers at the community house, where we communally feast on burgers, watermelon, and Costco cake, and enjoy whatever entertainment has been hired this year.  I think this year was the best - Frank Cassel "The Banjo Man"...

And this extremely patient balloon artist that put up with a lot of pushy parents (not ME, of course) and really obnoxious middle school boys who had nothing better to do than to heckle him.  My girls were really thrilled with their balloon corsage, sword, and braided thingy you see in the picture.

Red, white, and blue ice cream sandwiches topped off the morning.

And it's only 2pm.  We actually have at least two more big events today.  But since everyone is napping, and I have done some token cleaning-up around the place, thought I'd sit down for a minute, breathe deeply, and catch up on the important stuff: blogging.  Happy 4th to you all!