Husband and I spent the evening yesterday with members of his family on a pretty lake, celebrating family and the 4th of July, our nation’s birthday.
We enjoyed lots of good food while we waited for the sky to get dark and the fireworks to start. Unfortunately a pretty heavy thunderstorm blew through about the time we were going to start eating. We ran for the house.
That wasn’t the kind of dark sky we had hoped for. But lucky for us after the rain the sky cleared and the fireworks started on time.
We sat in lawn chairs on the shore and enjoyed the show. It reminded me so much of my childhood when my family would take our little 35 horsepower ski boat out on the water and watch the fireworks.
Lots of similar memories were made last night.
And though I did worry about my dog back at home, closed into a bedroom with the TV on loud, I couldn’t begrudge all the people out last night on a warm summer night watching the lights explode overhead. Later in the week when folks in the neighborhood are still setting them off I’ll be more grumpy.
I hope you all have the kind of 4th that best fits your family. And I hope this great American experiment lasts for centuries more.
Change Is Hard 
July 4, 2026 at 12:37 pm
Gorgeous images, Dawn! Happy 4th to you and yours!
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July 4, 2026 at 12:50 pm
Sitting in a lawn chair, using my phone….it was hard to time it right because at night the camera takes 3 seconds (I think seconds, might be some other measure of time) to shoot so I’d try to hit the shutter as I saw the canister shoot up into the sky but sometimes (often) that was too early. Still I’m happy and it was fun.
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July 4, 2026 at 2:56 pm
I know what you mean and frankly, you succeeded quite well!
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July 4, 2026 at 12:41 pm
Wow! Those are beautiful photos, Dawn. They remind me of one Northport 4th when the fireworks were set off against storm clouds. Very dramatic! I grew up watching fireworks over otherwise quiet cornfields as my sisters and I sat on the roof of our car and stuffed ourselves with popcorn and Kool-aid from home.
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July 4, 2026 at 12:52 pm
We waited through a thunderstorm before the fireworks, which reminded me of a time my husband and I waited in a rainstorm in a park in Maine to see the fireworks which were then shot up into a cloud filled sky and all we saw were colored clouds…which was interesting and certainly made for memories.
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July 4, 2026 at 12:41 pm
We’re in a hotel in Anaheim, CA for the weekend, and we watched the Disneyland fireworks from our room’s window last night. We should see them again tonight.
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July 4, 2026 at 12:57 pm
Do they shoot those off every night? I bet they are pretty. Are you going to visit Disneyland? Or wait. Disney world?
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July 4, 2026 at 1:52 pm
Disneyland in California – the World is in Florida. I think they shoot them off every night for a period of time, but I don’t remember how long. It’s been a lot of years since I lived down here. We’re here so Kat can spend a couple of days with her best friend of 41 years, and then we’re off to Ensenada for a week.
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July 4, 2026 at 1:29 pm
These were taken with your phone?! They sure did turn out great. All the news last night was showing how they are setting up our fireworks for tonight. Too darn hot to be out there!
How did Penny do by herself? Smart to have the TV turned up loud to block out the fireworks.
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July 4, 2026 at 2:07 pm
I think Pen had a rough evening. The thunderstorm would have freaked her out and we weren’t here. Throw rugs in the bedroom were in a heap when I got home and she was very needy. Took a long time to get her to settle. Then we got another thunderstorm about 3 a.m. this morning and it’s been downhill since then. Sigh. I promised her I wouldn’t leave her tonight.
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July 4, 2026 at 2:50 pm
Poor girl! You are a good dog-mom to stay with her tonight. I’m sure my kitties will be in a pile under the bed.
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July 4, 2026 at 2:59 pm
Beautiful pictures. A dim time for our country right now, but onwards and upwards!
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July 5, 2026 at 2:26 pm
As my Senator says….we can’t give up the ship!
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July 6, 2026 at 9:59 am
Absolutely!
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July 4, 2026 at 3:32 pm
Those are some beautiful fireworks Dawn. I’ll be grumpy too as the fireworks in the neighborhood have persisted for weeks and will be nonstop until the wee hours of July 5th and into next weekend, even though there are time limits for setting them off.
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July 5, 2026 at 2:28 pm
It hasn’t been too bad here until last night. But I figured given it was actually the 4th maybe some or most of it was the township. But not all of it. Michigan legalized big fireworks to be used by regular people several years ago (for the revenue from the high taxes on the fireworks) and since then it’s been like warfare for a few days before and after the 4th.
I am conflicted because I like to watch the ones put on by cities, but really don’t like the neighborhood fireworks.
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July 5, 2026 at 8:29 pm
Yes, it was not a good idea just to keep people from going to Ohio and getting fireworks and we were missing out. We never had the large fireworks in the neighborhood before that law passed. I was happy it rained on Friday as I knew there would be a lot of fireworks going off and I worried about an errant one landing on a shingle or the dry grass after the heat wave.
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July 5, 2026 at 5:18 am
Great images of the fireworks. I always enjoy when they are over water and I can capture some reflections.
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July 5, 2026 at 2:29 pm
I didn’t get much in the way of reflections. There was a community pier in front of us, filled with parked boats. And I was using my phone concentrating mostly on timing, but I can see that reflections would be cool.
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July 5, 2026 at 7:54 am
Love the fireworks photos! It has been a very long time since I’ve made it to a display or tried photos of them. Sound like a nice evening, except for the thunderstorm of course.
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July 5, 2026 at 2:30 pm
If I’m in Alabama for the 4th we usually go out in my brother’s boat. Otherwise I don’t see them either. But this year we got an invite from my husband’s nephew’s family and his father-in-law lives on a lake that does a nice job of them, so it was fun to watch. Brought back lots of memories of us on the lake growing up.
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July 5, 2026 at 2:16 pm
What gorgeous photos you’ve captured! I didn’t dare leave the house because of this terrified Monkey attached to my side. I had to content myself with watching the display on TV. Sigh. Last year, I was able to give him some calming chews, but they didn’t help as much as I’d hoped; this year, because of his special diet, I had to forego them. And my leaving earlier in the week for Band didn’t help!
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July 5, 2026 at 2:32 pm
I watched Detroit’s (they always do them way early) on TV with the sound off, Penny asleep next to me. When we went to the family thing Friday night I put Pen in the bedroom with the TV on loud, but we got a bad thunderstorm that night and I know she was freaked out. Last night, for the actual 4th I stayed in the bedroom with her and the loud TV and it was still awful. I think our Township was doing their show and that’s only a mile away. I hope tonight (the 5th) is quieter but I expect some neighborhood yahoos will be still celebrating.
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July 6, 2026 at 1:35 am
There are thousands (millions?) of people here in the USA, and all over the world who are war veterans who hate fireworks, who react even tho they try not to, who react with fear because of the sound. I have friends who tell me they watched their buddies be blown up and die in Vietnam to the same sound as these fireworks. I have two friends who were nurses in Vietnam who say they weren’t front line, but they dealt with the results of “front line”, and they too hate fireworks. They all ask, all of them … why are we celebrating war? why are we celebrating bombs and guns and killing? Those friends of mine and others ask … why aren’t we celebrating peace? Why are we polluting our lakes and rivers and salt water with the residue of fireworks? Why are we spending billions of dollars in the USA celebrating war and killing? Why aren’t we spending that money helping each other with food and medical care and housing?
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July 6, 2026 at 7:39 pm
I understand, to the extent I can having not been in war myself, this point of view, and think it is valid. In fact, sitting there on the shore of the lake watching the display I did, for a time, imagine that those were ‘bombs bursting in air’ and wondered just what it must have been like during the revolutionary war. I also, at different moments wondered how many PTSD veterans there were living around the large lake, figuring there were some, statistically, who were probably struggling with all this. Or maybe they have a plan for the 4th, I don’t know. And I worried about Penny home many miles away.
I think your questions are for someone higher up than me. I think they are valid questions. I kind of remember a time years ago when someone was trying to figure out a way to make fireworks silent. Obviously that didn’t pan out, if I’m even remembering right.
I don’t know the solution to your questions, but I encourage you to ask them of people that pass legislation. Michigan never used to let lay people shoot off ‘big’ fireworks, but they do now, and I didn’t agree with that. I imagine each state has their own rules.
Thanks for expressing the opposing point of view.
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