Funny Miriam and the 4th of July

We were driving home from my parent's house, where we had been "partying" over the fourth, and Miriam said to Kiersten (her cousin who we were returning to her mom), "In the game we are playing my name is Sweet Sweet Petunia."

Kiersten said okay and the "game" progressed with Miriam sounding more and more upset and angry. Finally I said, "Miriam, you need to sound nice even when you are playing. Besides, your name is Sweet Sweet Petunia so you should talk sweetly."

Miriam said, "But sometimes my friends call me Angry Angry Petunia and I talk angry!"

Oh, I get it now.

The fourth was a great but subdued weekend. We were going to get to my parents on Thursday night, but I caught Cowen's flu and probably due to pregnancy, it hit me a lot harder than it had hit him. So Thursday I sat on the couch and told the kids to not come near me, and they were pretty good. The house was in a shambles by the time Timothy got home, but that's not too far from normal anyway. When Timothy got home, I ran a hot tub (I mean warm, just as the pregnancy books suggest) and let him deal with everything. I was not up to driving for a block let alone an hour, so we stayed home that night.

Friday we made it to my parent's by about 11:00 am. It ended up being perfect. We saw Mom for a few minutes before she left for the Stadium of Fire (one of my nieces danced in it), and we gathered up Kiersten and Anders (niece and nephew) and headed to the parade. The parade was . . . hot. Pretty much wiped us all out. We stayed about an hour and a half then went back home where Dad gave everyone a go-gurt to pretend we served a healthy lunch (the main course was parade candy), and then the kids went down and played while the rest of us rested. As I told Kami on the phone, it was very strange not having Mom there--the kitchen table wasn't washed for a whole ten minutes after lunch was over!

The rest of the day I vegged on the couch except when Dad called me in to partake of his fourth of July barbecue and homemade rootbeer fest. He put a pound less sugar in the rootbeer this year and it was YUMMY!! One of his best batches.

Later Lindsay (my sister) and Wyatt (my brother whose wife Lindsay Ann is in Canada) arrived and complained about my being grumpy (me? grumpy when sick? never), and then Wyatt had us watch 20 minutes of a hilarious John Wayne/Dean Martin/Ricky Nelson movie and then I went to bed.

I felt much better this morning but was quite happy to send Timothy off on a hike alone as I didn't feel up to it and the kids were all too busy playing to be bothered, and Mom and I tied the baby quilt for Kami's new baby--Isabel Grace. She was born on the 2nd or something like that.

Then, several popsicles later--we came home. All in all, fairly restful and restorative. Dad cooked on the fourth, I got to make whatever I wanted for breakfast this morning as Dad was at the vet with free ingredients so we had scrambled eggs with bacon, onion, and mushroom mixed in (I swear, the luxury of mushrooms in your breakfast!!), toast and leftover fresh fruit salad. Grapes!!! What a treat. Like I said, all the milk I could drink with no price tag affixed and grapes and mushrooms--really, my parents house is the land of milk and honey.

Enough about that. It will only make me sadder that my house is always much closer to the woman who tried to give her dog a bone and found her cupboards bare. It's time to make bread again too, sheesh.

And no, Kayli, I am not posting pictures because I did not once break out my camera. Not when Anders and Emeline threw rocks at the police car, not when Cowen rode the didi (horse), not when Uncle Wyatt put the hose on the slide and the kids slid down so fast it looked like they were going to break bones--none of those things were recorded for posterity. Like I said, I mostly sat on the couch.

Happy holiday everyone!!