Happy birthday, America!

I'm not sure what the 4th of July has ever meant to me besides fireworks. I mean, I appreciate that war they fought oh so long ago to pass down to us this pretty awesome country that has its faults but all in all is a place I'm generally proud to live in and be from. Sometimes you feel that way more than others (the previous eight years, not so much), but I don't really know how to adequately celebrate or mark the passage of another year of nationhood for the U S of A. Danny's family has a great tradition of going to their house in Cannon Beach and participating in the morning 4th of July parade and having a cookout on the beach at night. The only trouble is they don't allow fireworks on the beach, which I completely respect because there are nesting bird populations there that deserve to be left alone, but seeing as how I apparently have a bit of a preoccupation with 4th of July fireworks to me, it always seems like something's missing. This year, having just returned from Minnesota, and having finally acquired ability that eluded me for so long to elect to NOT bite off more than I can chew, we decided to stay home and schedule our Oregon travels for a little later in the summer. So, I thought, this is the year to see fireworks! And what better place to see them than our state's capitol? This was not to be, however, as Jack's patience for being somewhere besides home ran out before we could get to the fireworks portion of the day. So then we thought, well, maybe we can see some from our balcony. The Berkeley marina or San Francisco or even Lake Merritt right here in Oakland. No such luck. We could hear all three shows very well, but between the trees and the fog, caught only one or two bursts of light. It did sound like we were in the middle of a revolutionary battle, though, which was kind of exciting. The bombs bursting in air, indeed.

What we did see in Sacramento instead of fireworks was our friends Nick and Libby. We decided the best way we could pay tribute to our country was to make and eat a lot of delicious food (or to have them make us a lot of delicious food while we tried to keep Jack occupied, as he was going through an unusually demanding phase this weekend) and to go wine tasting. Jack was adored everywhere we went and I think we got bigger pours because the sommeliers just wanted to hang out by us. So that is a note for all you wine-lovers out there, bring a baby with you the next time you go tasting. It was a beautiful day out in Amador County, even though I had feared the 100 degree heat the forecast had promised. It was just lovely in the shade. You gotta love that California dry heat. And vineyards make for great backdrops for family portraits. Not a lot of red white and blue in that photo, but we were patriotic on the inside!