Miss America

After the car drama, we arrived in Clovis for a long weekend to celebrate the 4th. Grandma & Grandpa’s house is always a good destination because it has several of Ten’s favourite things:

1) A swingset
2) A large blow-up kiddie pool
3) A big grassy lawn to run and play on
4) Toys you don’t have at home
5) Plastic eggs filled with candy hidden throughout the house
6) A dog to terrorize
7) Next door neighbor’s dogs to terrorize
8) Next door neighbors to stalk
9) A park & a grocery store within walking distance
10) Grandparents who have an endless supply of cookies, and will let you do/watch almost anything you want whenever you want.

You can see the appeal of this pre-schooler Nirvana, yes? Daddy & Mommy like it because it comes with lots of wear-the-kid-out activities, and 2 responsible adults who are delighted to watch and assist the child.

We spent Independence Day morning at the Rotary Playland in Roeding Park in Fresno. http://www.storylandplayland.com/default.asp The Fresno Rotary built this little carnival ride type amusement park in 1955. As an adult, I looked at it and thought “this place needs a serious coat of paint and some landscaping services”; but kids like Ten are just delighted to hop on the rides and run through the water play area. We even took the pirate ship pedal boats out for a cruise on the lake.

After a nice nap & some yummy bbq, Ten & Grandpa played a round of “golf” in the backyard (I think Ten has a future in hockey) while we waited for it to get dark. Then we moved to the driveway broke open the red, white& blue glowsticks, and began setting off the fireworks. At 9:30, the high school around the corner started setting off the big ones, so we walked to the corner with everyone else in the neighborhood and watched from there. The booming and high pitched whistling of piccolo petes’ stopped around midnight, signaling an end to this year’s celebration.

Ten spent Saturday swimming, swinging and asking for more fireworks. The guys taped up my car and I knit & napped. We left before church on Sunday morning in an effort to beat the traffic…but we’ll be back at the end of August. Well, one of us will anyway…