Happy 4th of July!

We started this Independence Day with Dennis and Carol cooking breakfast outside. Phil helped out with pancakes.

I had everything but pancakes, and it was all yummy! And strictly low-fat!!!

Almost everyone was wearing something patriotic in red/white/blue.

Actually, Dennis was wearing a Texas flag shirt on top of his special orange Gypsy Gathering rally shirt from “Steptember 2010” (misspelling not caught by anyone until much later) – not exactly a U.S. patriotic outfit, but we won’t hold it against him.

Carol wore a special vest her Mom made for her.

Happy Birthday, United States of America!

Later, we watched the Talkeetna parade. Don and I got there just in time to see the color guard leading the parade. But I didn’t get my camera in action until they had passed us.

Several entries had a wooden moose, painted and decorated in different themes. Later, an auction was held for the moose to raise money for community improvement.

Some spent more time on decorating their moose than others.

This is a restored Nash Rambler, probably 1950-1960 vintage.

Don thought this entry was the highlight of the parade. A woman sitting atop a minivan playing a piccolo.

If you could walk, ride a bicycle, push a stroller or walk a dog on a leash, you could be in the parade.

Does this stretch cab look familiar?

The Red Hat women had to get in the act, locally called Talkeetna’s Red Hot Ravens.

This truck was probably used to help build the Alcan.

And the grand finale, the local firetruck running its siren!

Just when we thought it was all over, the parade did a U-turn and came back past us, so we got to see it again!

Don bought our entries in the Moose Dropping contest. We were assigned numbers, with a souvenir painted moose dropping attached to pins to wear on our lapels.

Later, the bag of identically numbered moose droppings were dropped in the parking lot of the local VFW (Veterans of Foreign Wars). The announcer called for the raising of the bag.

The bag was prepared.

It was hoisted into position, high above the crowd.

The contents were released.

There was one clear winner in the inner circle.

None of us won, but we had a great time and ate a great BBQ lunch provided by the VFW.

Later, we had a terrific steak dinner. As this blog is getting really long, I’ll spare you the details and maybe report them another time. All in all, it was a wonderful and memorable Independence Day. I hope yours was equally special.