Happy Birthday Canada & A Reflection On Fireworks

I LOVE Canada Day.
I love big crowds. I love the energy they create. I love the bustle and the excitement.
Our day was almost over before it began when we arrived at C&K's house (where we were to meet D&B and the girls and M, B and G) and found out that K* had gotten a call from a mutual friend (who's hubby is an RCMP officer) to tell her that there was a bad accident and the road to get where we were going was closed. After about 45 minutes and dozens of calls, we got word that there was a detour, and even knowing we'd sit in traffic, our four-car-convoy hit pavement. The trip that should have taken a little less than an hour ended up taking two, but with the sun shining, windows rolled down and the stunning mountain pass view, no one was complaining.
We met up with a few more friends at a lovely beach park and BBQ'd, played baseball with a group of Australian tourists, tossed around a football (my arm was sore for days) and a frisbee and soaked up that sunshine!


:: My hubby, the grill-master ::

:: The lovely Auntie K* and Paisley's little buddy Gracie ::

:: Paisley having a chat with Uncle C* ::

Just before 7:00, we packed ourselves up and booked it westbound, found a pay-parking lot and then made the two block trek to our hotel. Yup, H-O-T-E-L. You see, we've know these two people, who are great and we like them a lot. They took the initiative to rent a two-story penthouse suite in a downtown hotel for the night so that we could all have someone to sit, hang, let the kidlets roam free from their strollers and watch the fireworks. In a word: INCREDIBLE. I think the overall consensus was that it is our new tradition.

People.....yeah, like 40,000 of them. A sea of red, white and CANADA ROCKS!


There's something magical about fireworks. Something that causes silence, demands attention and almost respect. I sat on the lower balconey on a plastic lawn chair snuggling #2 while the mister had #1. The first *crack* pierced the air and all fell quiet. Movement stilled. Eyes widened. About halfway through the show, during a brief cessation of the light and thunder, I stopped for a moment. I took a breath. I looked all around me. I quickly thought back to the almost a dozen Canada Day celebrations I had taken in, at this very harbour, over the past 17 years. It struck me how different my life is now. How much I've changed and grown and the crazy wonderful journey I've been on. I realized that in just five or ten mintues, the fireworks would stop, the applause and cheer would arise then die off and then the magic would be over and that moment I was in would be forever lost. So I held my daughter a little tighter and memorized the faces of the amazing people around me and made a choice to seal that moment in my mind. Just finally having the chance to sit and struggle to find the right word to express my emotions, causes my heart to well-up and burst with joy and gratitude and thankfulness. Here, is to God moments in the midst of pyrotechnics.....

By the time we packed up, walked to the car, and slugged through traffic, we got home around 12:30 and, well, collapsed. Denay fell asleep about 10 minutes into the crawl with her hand in her snack container, trying to grab a chocolate teddy graham.
The day in a word: epic.