On the 4th, we had lots of people over to eat and play--in all, 8 adults and 7 kids filled our little house to capacity. It was complete and utter chaos, but the good kind. Meg sat around all day with wide eyes, watching all the kids play. She loved it.
Now I've spoken before of the spastic, seventy-pound tornado that is Ripley the dog. When we planned to have people over to cook out, George and I talked about what to do with Ripley. Obviously, we wouldn't be able to eat on the back porch with him out there. It would be miserable fighting him off the whole time as he tried to snatch burgers off our plates. Plus, there were the kids to consider. Ripley has been great with Meg, but isn't what you might call a gentle dog. He's more like a runaway train with paws. Paws that seem to reach out from miles away and smack you in the face. He is apparently unable to control his body--especially when new people come around. I pictured children being knocked down like dominoes.
We planned to banish him to a neighbor's backyard for the day, but it became obvious that the glaring heat would force us to eat inside anyway and the kids ended up playing in the front yard, so he stayed home. But he got some playmates after all. Our five-year-old friend Grace, who has been afraid of him in the past, walked right out into the back yard and started chasing him (yelling Rib-a-ley!). Because he is somewhat scared of just about everything, he had no idea what to do at first, and just froze. But soon he was chasing and licking her and loving every minute of it.
I won't deny that there was still quite a bit of jumping up and knocking over during the play date, but overall I was proud of him. Maybe there's some hope for him yet.
We took Meg to see the fireworks, and she was fascinated for a while. She wasn't crazy about us covering her ears, though. She was so tired that she dozed off during the big finale, even with what seemed like crazy loud fireworks going off. Good times.
Soundtrack: Brandi Carlile, "Closer to You" (Have you heard of Brandi? I'm loving her these days. This whole album sounds like summer.)