4th of July Memories

With the 4th of July season upon us, I thought it might be fun to look back on some of the fun (and sometimes dangerous) antics my friends, family, and I have gotten into over the years with fireworks.

Before I get into the memories, I’d like to say that I do NOT recommend trying any of these ideas at home as they can be very dangerous if not done with the right people, the right fireworks, or in the wrong place.

When I was in high school, my dad decided that he would try out his own fireworks stand and my brother and I ran it together, along with a lot of help from my dad, and we had a great time choosing which fireworks to buy and resell and we lit a lot of the fireworks ourselves, obviously.

We had a lot of fireworks left over from the stand and they were stored in an upstairs room of a warehouse building that my grandpa owned. Unfortunately, in 2012, the building caught fire and all of the fireworks went off, making the fire even worse. I was actually on a school trip to New York City when I heard the news, and I was devastated. I’ll go into the full details of the fire in another blog post soon so you guys can hear the whole story.

My favorite 4th of July memory is making “mystery boxes” with my dad and my brother. What is a “mystery box” you might ask? It is exactly what it sounds like. What we would do is gather up a number of different types of fireworks and put all of them in a box together. We had a cement platform that we would use to light the box on fire and run to a safe distance to wait and see what happens. It was always fun watching the fireworks go off knowing that we were prepared to take care of any problems that could come.

Another favorite of mine for 4th of July is my dad’s “cannon” that he would light off at midnight. The “cannon” didn’t have any projectiles, so it was perfectly safe, but it made a good and loud BOOM! The design was simple, but 100% effective.

The only problem we ever had with the “cannon” was when someone tried to use the wrong kind of powder and the “cannon” itself blew into pieces!

As I said, do NOT try these ideas at home, they can be INCREDIBLY dangerous!

This year for the 4th, I plan to celebrate with my fiance’s family in Council Bluffs and then make our way to Chicago for a family reunion with my grandma’s side of my family. I’m really excited for this weekend and I think it will be a lot of fun!

I’ll post another blog next week with the details of how the trip goes!

Have a safe and happy 4th! Much love,

Brady \m/ (>.<) \m/