July 4th at Dickens

July 4th was a real celebration at C&M Farms located outside Dickens, Texas (60 miles east of Lubbock in the panhandle.) All the grandkids on my side of the family were there at one time or another except for Kelly & Tami's 6 girls. If they had been there, we would have had 34 people. Friday night we went to town and ate hamburgers around the courthouse square and then set in lawn chairs waiting for dark so we could see the fireworks display. The Dickens volunteer fire department has been very busy this year due to the lack of rainfall. Fires pop up all the time and with gas prices as high as they are, they had a fund raiser not long ago for them and raised over $12,000 in one night. Every fourth of July though, the firemen purchase fireworks and put on this display for the community. One of the guys told my dad (who was the fire chief in Dickens for 8 years) that they buy them wholesale and paid $1200 for $3000 of fireworks. It was a REALLY good show. And man, you couldn't ask for better seats. In fact when one of the rockets fell over and burst all over the crowd, it was a little closer than some wished for. Fortunately, no one was seriously injured.

Saturday we grilled hot dogs and ate and ate some more. We had a one year old birthday party for my nephew's little boy, Nate. He really got into that cake. The kids took buggy rides on Daddy's mule. They dug in the dirt. They played on the hay at the barn and tried to catch the gold fish in the cow trough.

We took Sandy with us to the country and Tony & Elena brought Kowboy, too. They ran and ran and just wore themselves out. Those 2 city dogs were given out by the time we all went home Sunday morning. They both got in another cow trough and swam on Friday afternoon. Just like 2 kids playing in the water. Kowboy must have pulled a muscle getting in and out of it, because he wouldn't get back in it on Saturday when we went back for them to play in it again. Tony wound up taking him to the vet because he was hurting. He's much better, apparently just a pull or strain. Both dogs just slept and laid around when we got them home. Sandy didn't really start eating again until Wednesday. He just slept all the time. Charlie, the resident Beagle at C&M Farms, was not too thrilled about these 2 Golden Retrievers coming on his property----until the fireworks started going off. Then he was more than willing to come lay down by the other 2 boys and be friends.

Saturday night Tony put on a special encore fireworks show just for our family. We all got our lawn chairs and sat out in the driveway of my parents' home and watched as Tony set them off. They had bought $25 worth of fireworks----you would have thought it was $25K. We cheered and sang and had a great time with them. The kids got to hold sparklers.

Tony & Elena also brought their telescope that Nikita & Ana got for Christmas. It was a cloudless night and with no city lights to interfere, you could see all the multitude of stars and plantets. We got to look at the moon and actually SEE the craters. It was just too cool. Then we saw Mars, Saturn with its rings and then Jupiter with its 4 moons. For the first time ever the moon, those rings and those moons are really REAL to me because I saw them with my own eyes. All the grandkids (and their moms & dads) took turns looking through the telescope. That was awesome.