4th of July!

We had a great time celebrating America's Independence Day with a couple of other American families from our church. This was our first time celebrating the 4th of July here in the UK. Why?!? I can't remember... Anyway, now that we've started, we'd better do it every year! :)

As the 4th fell on a Wednesday, Ben and the other guys had to work and the kids had school, which made it a bit interesting and quite different than the way you'd celebrate in America (no pancake breakfast and no parade). :) ( I was lucky it was one of my days off!). So we headed to our friends' house in Coventry (about 20 minutes away) after everyone was finished with school and work and after I finished my (first ever) flag cake! :)

Here I am with Rebekah, our friends' youngest daughter (3 months old and soooo cute!). (And no, I'm not "broody" - as they say it in England - I just like to hold her and give Dakin a break). :)

John was our "master-chef" and grilled some yummy burgers and spiral hot dogs! 

We were thrilled that the weather cooperated and we were able to grill and have the first bite outside. However, let's not forget that this is England and the nice weather doesn't last very long; even in July! [English friends reading this, I'm not saying this in a condescending way, you know; I'm sure if you had any say in it, you'd arrange for something a little bit better, at least during the summer. ;)] So, when it started to drizzle we went inside and carried on. That's what you do... :)

But then, luckily, it stopped raining (again, talk about the weather changing every other minute) and we were able to go outside and have some fireworks and sparkles!

Andrei was not very fond of holding the sparkles, but thanks to Mitzi, he slowly "warmed up" to them. ;)

Did I say anything about the weather in this post? ;) Less than 5 minutes after we finished with the fireworks and went back inside and were gathering our stuff to get ready to head home (after all, it was past 9 pm and the kids had to go to school the next day!!!), it started POURING! We got soaked just running from the house to the car! :) But it was a funny end to a fun evening, spent with good friends, celebrating a great country!