So UnAmerican

We got our boy back last Wednesday and although he screamed (not cried, mind you, screamed) most of the two hour ride home, I didn't care one bit. Jake, on the other hand, tore up an entire paper towel and stuffed it in his ears "to take the edge off".

My friend Erin has come up over the 4th of July 3 years in a row now, and this year she got the pleasure of giving Mason a haircut. He has desperately needed one as we was sporting a mullet in the back, but I wanted to wait for Erin to do it. She did a fantastic job and actually cut herself because Mason was constantly turning his head to see the scissors. He looks like a little boy now and I am coming to terms with the fact that he is more toddler than baby.

I didn't feel like trekking downtown for the fireworks this year. They don't start until 10:30 because it's still light at 10, which means we would have to wake up Mason and roll the dice on whether he would enjoy the fireworks or make us regret ever waking him up. Our neighborhood was having a block party and when Erin and I returned from dinner the entire neighborhood was at the house across the street from ours. I had forgotten about it completely and didn't really want to party with the neighbors anyway. As a side note, we are known as the "antisocial Bennetts" because we spend a lot of time inside our house or in our back yard as opposed to our front. It should also be noted that almost every one of our neighbors has children between the ages of 4 and 8, which means they are always outside with their kids.

Yeah, so, as we pulled up around 7:00 my neighbor said "Hey you guys, come on over!" I waved from the garage and then put the garage door down. We never left the house again that night. Everyone pooled their fireworks and I was annoyed by the sounds of them for over 90 minutes. My disdain for home fireworks is another blog entry entirely. The next morning Jake was out front and one of the kids said "Why don't you guys celebrate the 4th of July?" Jake told him that we do celebrate it, just in a different way, inside our house. Later the same day, the 4 year old neighbor girl said to me as I was getting the mail "My brother says you don't believe in the 4th of July, don't you love America?" Ok, so I think it's safe to say that we've taken anti-social to a whole new level.