A 4th of July Smorgasbord (sp?) post!

Ok, a quick Google search has told me that I did spell that correctly. It's one of those words that you hear and say your whole life without spelling it, and when you go to do so, you become paranoid that people will think you daft. Admit it, how many other people thought "next door" (as in "The Wilsons live next door to us") was actually "next store" for the first 10 years of their life? Just me? All right, then.

Since it's a long holiday weekend, I won't be posting for a few days, missing a 7 Quick Takes Friday, so I thought I'd make this post a bit of an Independence Day Weekend Administrative Summary Including Humorous Highlights. Let us begin.

Tomorrow we will go and barbecue with my parents at their house and I'm certain that the children will want to go in their pool. When I was a child I used to love to swim, but now I have to admit that I avoid it unless absolutely necessary. I don't totally know why, but there you have it. I prefer to sit *beside* the pool and sip a drink while soaking up the gentle breeze. So, I suppose I enjoy a pool's ambiance if not the actual water.

And my mother, who I never saw drink nary a single glass of wine for my entire childhood, now creates inventive cocktails for us when we're at her house for dinner. Maybe it's only after age 30 that we're allowed into this Cocktail Club, but I have to say it's a lot of fun, if a bit surprising. She makes a sangria that could fell a super hero, I tell you.

"Mom, what's in this?"

"Oh, just some brandy and wine. And cognac. And vodka. And..."

Clearly, our mother wants us to become unconscious before the end of the evening. Pacing oneself is an absolute necessity in that house.

So it'll be stiff drinks and hot dogs and hamburgers. Join us anyone?

Friday I'm off from work and we'll be wrangling the children, and then likely having dinner with Mike's parents. I have belly dance class later, and we've been invited to dance at a festival the last weekend in July that will inevitably involve a flurry of choreography practicing and formation changes. It'll be fun, but we have a new member, so I'm not entirely sure how we'll figure out costumes and such, but we'll get there. We have a bunch of slots that we can use to dance, so we've all been invited to do solos if we desire to, which is profoundly terrifying if a bit exciting. I'm not sure if I will yet or not, but if I do, NO PROPS. I'll just dance. But it'll be a big crowd, so I don't know. I'm sure there will be a frenzied discussion of all of this on Friday.

Saturday, Henry is invited to a pool party. He's excited, and I'm excited for him, but you know, this means that I have to *talk* to people that I don't know all that well, and you all know how social I am. :) That is to say, NOT VERY. I'll have to be all brave and everything.

Sunday, we'll have Mass and not much else, which will be lovely. I'm planning on doing lots of knitting, so that I can finish up the projects I'm working on to begin some fall and winter gifts. I'm also reading Mother Dolores Hart's The Ear of the Heart for our next Catholic Book Club installment, and at well over 400 pages, it's a bit imposing. I'm making steady progress, but it's slow going. So I'll work on that as well, but I can't guarantee there will be a book club post next week, may be the week after!

At any rate, Happy 4th of July everybody! I don't know that we'll do fireworks, since Anne can't stay awake late enough for them. We'll probably watch them on tv like we usually do and breathe a sigh of relief that we don't have to talk to strangers and battle traffic to do so. Because we're weird like that.

I'll post again on Monday, see you all then!