Independence Day in Kerrville

This year, Independence Day hit me like a ton of bricks.
  
Weird, huh?

I am grateful for our country and amazed to have been born here, and in awe of our founding fathers and all that they accomplished.

But what I mean is that this was the last big holiday in our first year of living in Kerrville.  They say that the first two years of living in a new place bring the most abrupt adjustments, and the first year does so especially.

I am here to testify that the first year has indeed been full of adjustments and hard things (Not only those things, but that's not what I'm talking about right now.)

As I may or may not have written about before, each change of season, each holiday has brought with it the struggle to know how to do that thing HERE.  How do we do Christmas in Texas?  Back in late May I wondered aloud on Facebook how to do summer here?  But we made it through June just swimmingly and so when July 4th snuck up on me and made me cry, I was caught unawares.

Here's how it went down:
We sent Theo and Clayton off to Boston on July 3.  Getting them packed up for two weeks of camp all while I contemplated them alone on an airplane was enough to make me very emotional.  Add to that the knowledge that they were going to hug our best friends, be in BOSTON, see the Boston fireworks and go back to our old church.  It was enough to make me cranky and weepy.

Then John drove them away to Austin to get on the plane, and the rest of us here were sad.  Walter was downright mad that he hadn't also decided to go to camp this year.  We went to Dairy Queen to make ourselves feel better, but it only helped for a few minutes.  For me, anyway.

Late that night, Theo called from Logan airport and he was just absolutely buoyant. SO excited to be in Boston and with our dearest friends, his other parents and siblings, whom he has known his entire life.

The next day was Independence Day.  I woke up early and prayed and cried.  I cried for missing our city, our friends, things familiar and for missing our boys, the first ones in our family to go home and visit.    

The rest of the week was kind of weepy and homesick for me.  But we DID have a good Fourth of July celebration at the river in Kerrville!  And my good pal, Mandy, was there with her kids and her husband, and her amazing dog, and she got why I was sad.  She and her family are a blessing!

John and Mandy are being watched over by Super Man.  Thank goodness he was there.

Sizzles the wonder dog.  This guy helped cheer Walter up.  How can you not be happy when there's a weiner dog around?!

Lucy and her pal.  Aren't they the cutest?!  And look...they are wearing stars and stripes!  

All the world's a stage when you're (almost) 6 and 7.  Especially is you find a big uninhabited cement slab in the park.

Three generations enjoying the 4th together.  Though for Walter "enjoying" may be too strong a word.

Just one of the things you can see in Texas...tiny horses riding in trucks!  There was one in the front seat, too.

If you know Texas music, you may know Robert Earl Keene.  He lives in Kerrville and was the headliner of this fun event.  And John, of course, got to meet him!

Always in the right place at the right time, that John.

So there we have it.  We've made it through all the major holidays and almost all of our birthdays; Clayton will celebrate his birthday while he's at camp. 

It's been a good but hard year.  In the next few weeks, I'm planning on blogging about the past year, catching up on things that I didn't record.  It will be mainly for my own good, but hopefully a few of you can enjoy it as well!

Happy, happy summer Y'ALL! (Did you just hear me say that?!)