Independence Day 2026

This year, Independence Day got off to a bad start. Like, a really awful, painful one. Specifically, the culprit was kidney stones, the likes of which I had been through previously a few years ago.

It began on Friday night, July 3. That old feeling of being kicked in the groin came back and stayed for an uncomfortably long while, making minutes feel like hours and hours feel like a day. Bless her heart, my sleep-deprived, longsuffering wife took me to the ER at 2 a.m. to get checked out. The doctor and the CT scan confirmed a kidney stone that was, thankfully, on the way out of my poor, tired body.

0 of 10 stars, would not recommend.

So, after declaring my independence from that kind of discomfort, I was released to go home. Under the circumstances, JB and I decided it best to stay home from the family Cul-de-Sac of Fire and BBQ down at our cousins' home in Lehi while I recuperated. We instead watched a few patriotic favorites on TV—Rocky IV and Independence Day among others—while I kicked back and rested. We were sad to miss out on the family gathering but were also glad to be home with our dogs while a few random fireworks went off.

Speaking of which, the state of Utah had banned the use of private fireworks this year due to extreme drought conditions and the prevalance of a number of wildfires being fought across the state. So when I mention that a few random fireworks still went off, they weren't really supposed to.

Anyhow, I was feeling slightly better the next day, Sunday the 5th, and so JB and I made it out to Biz's and Jeff's home in West Bountiful for June family dinner with the Plowmans. (June's family dinner had been delayed a week because of number of the families were out of town or had previous commitments the week before.)

The food was delicious, and the company was great. To fulfill our food assignment, JB made these American Flag Jell-O jigglers for dessert:

Independence Day 2022

We observed Independence Day together as a family Monday evening in a get-together at the clubhouse in Ben's and Adi's HOA in Centerville. A fire had broken out on the hillside in Centerville the night before, but fortunately no one on either side of the family had to evacuate their homes. And the show went on.

At our shindig, the goodies included hot dogs, chips, apple pie, watermelon, and homemade ice cream. Mom contributed this cake, with blueberries and strawberries in the form of the United Kingdom's Union Jack flag (get the tongue-in-cheek reference? She was born in England but is now a U.S. citizen):

JB is pretty amazing with our niblings, including two-year-old Sadie:

Kenna and the littles enjoyed a game of foosball, while others also played that and air hockey. Some watched The Sandlot, playing on the TV screen there.

No fireworks? No problem. This being a drought year (and also thinking of the Centerville fire), we skipped them this year and watched the West Bountiful show instead.

Independence Day 2021

We observed this year's Independence Day over the course of a few nights this past weekend. Due to state restrictions and guidelines—we are, in fact, in the middle of a severe drought—we did not shoot off any fireworks. I cried for, like, three seconds about this, but somehow I got over it.

Anyhow, we did get together as a family, and we did barbecue and such, which is one of the truly great things about living in America. Mike and Jana brought one of the desserts, which was a twist on the usual American flag dessert cake:

I guess this is how you celebrate the 4th when you have a British mom!

It was so hot out that Sadie celebrated with just a diaper on:

Independence Day 2019

Our country had another birthday this past week. Our family celebrated the occasion, as we are wont to do, by getting together to enjoy a barbecue and fireworks.

Scott and Claudia invited us down to their home in Lehi, where we were also reunited with our cousins Jamie and Jared (who was visiting us from California) and portions of their families. It was the biggest extended family group we've had together in one place since Dad's funeral over two years ago. Claudia's cousins from California also joined us for the occasion.

The hamburgers and hot dogs were plentiful and delicious, as were the fruit and other side dishes, as well as the desserts.

This Fourth of July was unusual in that it was much cooler than others in recent memory. A storm blew in at one point, driving the BBQ indoors for a few hours.

Fortunately, the storm broke in time for us to light of some fireworks out on the street, what we like to call Cul-de-Sac of Fire. By this time, the temperature had dropped to the 60s, which is rather unseasonable for July. And I loved it.

The fireworks were also plentiful, as well as colorful.

The company was even better, and it was good to spend an afternoon and evening with our extended family members.

Independence Day, Part 2

Wednesday, July 4, which was the second day of two consecutive days' worth of family holiday fun, took us to Mom's house in North Salt Lake. We enjoyed a delicious BBQ and played board games while the kids waded in the kiddie pool:

That took us to fireworks at dusk, bringing out the pyromaniacs in more than a few people. The next-door neighbor, like you do, brought his cannon (yes, a cannon, apparently) out onto the street to fire it off a couple of times, scaring the McGinnies out of one and all.

It was both Tanner's and Isaac's first Independence Day.

There's something purely enjoyable about getting together with family and celebrating our country's birthday by doing our darndest to burn down our little corner of it.

Independence Day, Part 1

This year's Independence Day festivities included two family parties, held (respectively) on the 3rd and 4th of July.

Sometimes, I have to pinch myself to remember on a daily basis that my family now includes a wife, parents-in-law, three brothers-in-law, three sisters-in-law, and seven additional nieces and nephews (niblings). And each one of them is a pretty amazing person.

On the 3rd, we assembled together at the parents-in-laws' home in West Bountiful for a BBQ and something I'd never tried before: axe throwing. Tyson showed us all how it was done:

. . . after which JB showed off her stuff and reminded me once again to never mess with her to the point of ever getting frustrated enough to throw an axe in my direction.

As for my own efforts, of which JB snapped some photos, I'll say that axe throwing is somewhat harder to do than it looks. But it's also a lot of fun. I found that the two-handed method works a lot better for me than trying to throw an axe right handed only. It helps explain why I woke up the next morning barely above to move because my muscles were so sore from the attempt.

To close out the evening, Spencer set up a movie screen in the backyard, and we watched the recent Spielberg movie Ready Player One in the Great Outdoors, with only the mosquitoes to keep us company.

Land of the Free

"Given this land
If they live
Righteously."

 -"Book of Mormon Stories" (emphasis added)

We're hearing that word a lot about the United States of America today, being Independence Day. And rightly we should! We should be very proud of her today, on her 240th birthday.

Nevertheless, I have observed that not everyone out there is exactly proud of this country. Have you found that the people who complain about things here in this country are, with few exceptions, largely those who have never traveled outside of its borders? I have. Thanks to social media expanding all of our scopes of view, we're often hearing that we're (collectively) racist, evil, and that people who don't have the rights they should are still lacking those rights.

Granted, we have a handful of people in our country who are making a bad name for the rest of us out there. There are also secret combinations, just as the Book of Mormon warned us about, in the government, the media, and other places. But honestly I shudder when we're called these horrible names as a whole.

Meanwhile, much of the rest of the world faces terrorism on a daily basis, isn't free to speak its mind or to worship according to the dictates of its own conscience, and faces real, dangerous, largely unchecked bigotry in the form of women who are not allowed to sneeze without a man present and homosexuals and Christians both who are jailed, thrown off of rooftops, or are put to death in other horrific ways.

It's a nutty world out there, and you only have to look on the daily newscast to see just how insane things are.

Having traveled to a number of foreign countries and having lived in another for years myself, I am very grateful for just how good we really do have things here. During my time in Peru, I was first shocked to observe people call out racially charged things in my direction as I walked down the street each day, and then I just got used to it. And like my previous statement about the few giving a bad name to the whole, this was certainly the case; though I don't know of a single place here in my home state of Utah where you will walk down the streets in fear of a similar thing happening.

Just look around you. Where some see prison cells, I see freedom and liberty.

But can freedom be too much freedom?

Elder D. Todd Christofferson of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, in a speech last week on religious freedom, taught:

"We are in the middle of a rights revolution. Sometimes the alleged new rights are important to correct injustices. But sometimes these supposed rights are little more than demands that government forces others to conform to society's new moral preferences."

To follow up on my previous post, another of the many reasons I preach the restored gospel of Christ, as revealed by living prophets and Apostles, is because possession of this land comes with a promise contingent on our behavior:

"This is a choice land, and whatsoever nation shall possess it shall be free from bondage, and from captivity, and from all other nations under heaven, if they will but serve the God of the land, who is Jesus Christ, who hath been manifested by the things which we have written" (Ether 2:12; emphasis added).

We can see what happened to the Jaredites and Nephites who broke this covenant. What will happen to us?

Let us never take our freedom for granted by always striving to choose the right. Ultimately, we cannot have our rights without righteousness.