The Fourth of July is not like Valentine’s Day. The Fourth of July is a good holiday. The Fourth of July is, I daresay, the best holiday (besides my birthday, of course). For those who have read my sentiments about Valentines Day, I wish to inform you that I feel completely the opposite about this holiday! This is a day about hot dogs! About parades (which I was a participant in until about the age 18)! About warm summer breeze, and getting dark late! It’s about sparklers! Popsicles! It’s about fireworks! And you know, it’s kinda about America, I guess.

Most unlike Valentines Day, I have had a string of GREAT Fourth of July’s. To me, it’s the most romantic wonderful holiday there could possibly be. Not romantic in a lovey dovey, commercialized “I will send you a card with pink on it because I’m morally obligated to by Hallmark and St. Cupid,” but rather the 4th of July is romantic in an “I literally see fireworks when I kiss you,” sort of way. Not that this is the only reason that it’s romantic. Let’s not forget the hot dogs.

There was the countless Fourth of July’s in Sugar House Park in Salt Lake City. There were the numerous parades with my cousins, where we sported the blatantly false t-shirts reading “Everyone loves an American girl,” and formulated was the code names of “Baseball” and “Ice Cream,” for all the hot guys we saw. There were church breakfasts at Water’s Edge, and there was Transformers and a brilliant rainstorm after the best firework show of my life just last year. I feel like the Fourth of July is the holiday where I consistently spend with the most important people in my life. Let this year be no exception.

I am excited to announce, thanks to the lovely scheduling ladies at work, that I have this beautiful day off, and so I am going to do it up right, Utah style. Any suggestions for how I could possibly make this amazing holiday any better than it already is?