Happy Birthday Greg

July 21st...Happy Birthday Thinking of you! Love you!

Birthdays, Beach and Wedding

This is a busy month. Greg is going to be a year older on the 21st, and although he is in Afghanistan, I think he will have a nice birthday...or there abouts..because..GregIII is due any time after the 20th. I hope he is born on his daddy's birthday, as it will be easy to remember..no, I think it would be nice for GregII. So, Happy Birthday to Greg, and happy birthday for Holly! I hope it is an easy birth, and all goes FAST and WELL.

Holly has been calling quite a bit to let us know how she is doing. I think being in Italy is a challenge for her, but yet, it makes her very strong, since there really isn't anyone to lean on right now. She has Greg on the phone from time to time..but that is hardly enough!!!!!

Greg seems to be enjoying his Medical training and work. He is buying books to study. That is good. He will be alot better when he has about 2 more years experience!!!!! I think that is a great thing he is doing. He was in the 82nd Airborne when he started....I couldn't jump out of a window, much less an airplane...flying high...! God Bless them, they do a great job learning to do that. Then, he decided to be a Medic. That is the best he can do for his fellow soldiers.

I have adopted 4 of his platoon members..send boxes and letters. I am sure they would rather hear from someone their own age, but they are stuck with me. I think they are to be admired, also. I hope to get a picture of them soon, so I can put a face with the letters and packages!!!!!
The post office has the 9 dollar package...I spent a ton of money sending boxes to Iraq when Greg was there. This is really nice, as you can pack anything and weight, into the box, and it is $9 ... Very good for sending to APO.

Everyone is praying for our soldiers. God Bless America.

Later this month we will go back to beach, and attend our Nephew's marriage. It will be 2 days of fun, I am sure. They have dated a long time.

Today is dark and looks like rain again. Yikes....Texas won't be in a drought for at least 3 more months..We are getting everyone's rain. Beach is in for more too, and that means more flooding!
The weather is fine..it is Saturday, and I am going to read!

CAN YOU SAY 8 PLUS?

8 plus inches of rain at the beach since late Monday, early Tuesday. Yikes. We have water standing in all the yards. A few years ago, they dug a ditch to carry the water around our property and on to the little water inlet that is between some of the houses down the road. That saved us! Our yard is wet, but no standing water. We used to have 3-4 inches standing after a big rain.

We came down to the beach Sunday. It rained From Monday evening until this morning about 6:00 a.m. I heard it raining very hard around 5:00 and got up to see. We have had enough rain now, and whom ever is still doing the "rain dance" can stop! Texas has had enough.

The sun did come out some today, and it is supposed to be good tomorrow. I hope !!!!!

I am trying not to do anything that looks like I am dancing! See ya!

P. S. This is written on July 7th. Yesterday morning we had 8 more inches, and the total rainfall for Crystal Beach Cabin is 15.55". I thought it would never stop. Water is everywhere, and slowly sinking into the ground. There were more people playing in the puddles in the yard than going to beach. Of course that isn't real smart since all the homes are on ceptic systems. Yuck. I don't think I will play in the water this week. Perhaps next visit.

John is coming down today, if he can swim past Houston, and we will head to Lake Charles, tomorrow. We heard Marshal's is having a good sale down there. Sure.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY AMERICA

The July 4th celebration has become a picnic. Why do we take such a big day in our history so lightly? We head for the beaches, we Bar B Q, and we have to include thanking God for our wonderful country, and our wonderful history. We have made mistakes, as a nation, but all in all America is the place people want to be. I haven't heard of too many Americans "sneaking" into Mexico, or Canada....or any country, for that matter. Why is that? DUH! We are the most wonderful, generous, helpful nation in the world.

Up until 9-11, no one has ever had the nerve to come to our 48 state shores. Yes, there was Pearl Harbour, but before it was part of our United States. We are in a struggle for our very existence, and we better take it very seriously. I love America. It is just that simple.

When the Declaration of Independence was signed, we were on our way. Do you know what the Declaration says? Do you understand the words? Perhaps this will help. I got this off the Internet this morning, to remind myself, and YOU, of our interesting history.

The Declaration of Independence

We hold these truths to be self-evident,
that all men are created equal,
that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights,
that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

*Copied and pasted from the Internet:

With these memorable words, Thomas Jefferson, at the age of 33, laid the cornerstone of the United States of America. Though the Declaration of Independence, or, as it was known at the time, "The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America," holds no legal standing, it stands at the head of the US Code. The signed copy resides in the National Archives in Washington, DC.

Fifty years later, in an 1825 letter, Jefferson wrote that the Declaration of Independence was designed as "an appeal to the tribunal of the world." The document was therefore "intended to be an expression of the American mind, and to give to that expression the proper tone and spirit called for by the occasion," and the fledgling state was thus introduced to the nations among which it was destined to assume its rightful place.

To lay the moral foundation for revolution, the Declaration of Independence invokes the principle of natural rights, which is strongly identified with John Locke (particularly in Two Treatises of Government, 1690). These are the basic rights of which each individual is possessed, and of which he cannot be stripped by society or government. In Jefferson's formulation, the "pursuit of happiness" was substituted for Locke's more specific "health" and "possessions."

An enlightened reader might wonder about the contradictory relationship between natural rights and the institution of slavery. Indeed, Jefferson's initial draft included the following among the offenses laid at the doorstep of King George III:

He has waged cruel war against human nature itself, violating its most sacred rights of life & liberty in the persons of a distant people who never offended him, captivating & carrying them into slavery in another hemisphere, or to incur miserable death in their transportation thither.

This clause was edited out in order to secure the votes of the southern delegates. Nevertheless, the Declaration of Independence has been cited as the inspiration for such causes as abolition, universal suffrage and civil rights.

The document goes on to list "a long train of abuses and usurpations" perpetrated by King George III that led to the decision "to throw off such Government." After all, "A Prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people."

Let no one imagine that the decision was rashly undertaken. During the years leading up to the Revolutionary War, most colonists had no thought of political separation from their homeland. But they grew increasingly alienated by unjust treatment: "Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury." And it wasn't only the monarch who was unresponsive: "Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our British brethren... We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity... They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and consanguinity."

It is noteworthy that the adoption of the Declaration of Independence took place against the backdrop of ongoing Revolutionary War hostilities. When the signers affixed their John Hancocks upon the document they were jointly laying their lives on the line, since there was a bounty on the revolutionaries' heads:

And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.

When Benjamin Franklin said, upon signing the Declaration of Independence, "We must all hang together, or assuredly we shall all hang separately," it was no less than the literal truth.

Fifty-six men were signatories to the engrossed copy of the Declaration of Independence that Congress ordered to be made on July 19, 1776. John Hancock, as president of Congress, was first, and he famously wrote his name front, center and large. He and 49 others signed on August 2, 1776, in geographic order of the colonies they represented, from north to south. They signed with ink from the Syng inkstand, currently on display at Independence Hall in Philadelphia. Six other signatures were added later, the last one, that of Thomas McKean, in 1781.

The story of the birth of the United States is thrilling and inspiring, full of heroes and their words and deeds. Can you identify these men, statements, and events:

Stamp Act	Boston Tea Party
Intolerable Acts	Continental Congress
No taxation without representation	Give me liberty, or give me death!
Midnight Ride of Paul Revere	Battles of Lexington and Concord
George Washington	Ethan Allen and the Green Mountain Boys
Battle of Bunker Hill	Battle of Saratoga
John Paul Jones	Benedict Arnold
Valley Forge	Battle of Yorktown
Marquis de Lafayette	Treaty of Paris

Celebrations then and now

I am apt to believe that it will be celebrated by succeeding generations as the great anniversary festival.
It ought to be commemorated as the day of deliverance, by solemn acts of devotion to God Almighty.
It ought to be solemnized with pomp and parade, with shows, games, sports, guns, bells, bonfires, and illuminations, from one end of this continent to the other, from this time forward for evermore.
— John Adams, letter to Abigail Adams, July 3, 1776 (referring to the day before, when the resolution for independence was passed)

Adams' words were prescient, even though he was off by two days. As the news spread, celebrations began immediately. In that first year they featured readings of the Declaration of Independence in public places, accompanied by the firing of muskets and cannon. The statue of King George in New York was torn down and its lead turned into bullets. Everywhere were military parades, bells ringing, toasts, fireworks, music and "loud huzzas." In 1781, the legislature of Massachusetts became the first to officially designate the Fourth of July as a holiday commemorating the birth of independence; in 1783 — the year the Revolutionary War formally ended — the governor of North Carolina followed suit.

Nowadays, celebrations include such all-American activities as picnics and barbecues (featuring hot dogs, hamburgers, baked beans, potato salad and apple pie), baseball games, races and contests, parades with marching bands and Revolutionary War-era costumes, reenactments of historical events, concerts featuring patriotic songs, fireworks at dusk, and more.

Thus may the 4th of July, that glorious and ever memorable day, be celebrated through America, by the sons of freedom, from age to age till time shall be no more. Amen, and amen.
— Virginia Gazette, July 18, 1777

This about says it all. God Bless America!