4th of July Fun

We hope that everyone had a wonderful 4th of July! We certainly did here. Our festivities began on Friday when our friends Crystal and John came over for a BBQ. We had a great time catching up on things, and the Cardonis told us about their amazing trip to England in June. Greg and I are sad because Crystal and John will be moving to Nashville next month, but we are also excited for the new opportunities they will have (and it will give us an excuse to visit Nashville). We had a really fun evening, and it was a great way to start the 4th of July weekend.

Saturday, of course, was the parade, and then on Sunday we just went to church and relaxed around here. Then yesterday the Andreasens (their dad is the bishop of our ward) invited us over for a fun evening. We swam in their pool, had a BBQ, played croquet (the croquet course ended up being pretty extreme and even involved hitting the ball through a tree house), and set off some fireworks. One of my favorite parts of the evening was when Sister Andreasen, Greg, and I climbed into their little row boat and headed out on the lake behind their house to look for blackberries. My job was to bail water out of the boat since it sometimes leaks--but only a little bit of water came in. Unfortunately the blackberries weren't quite ripe, but it was still fun to go hunting for them. So, we had a fun evening with the Andreasens and the missionaries (who came over for dinner), and then on our way home we got to see the fireworks being set off in Springfield. It was a great day, and I am grateful to live in this country!

4th of July Parade

Yesterday was the annual 4th of July parade in the Village of Jerome (part of Springfield), and the museum got to participate in the parade. It was so much fun! I can't figure out why Springfield itself doesn't have a 4th of July parade downtown--they have parades for everything else, but at least someone around here has a parade celebrating Independence Day. We all got to the museum bright and early where all of the historic Jeeps and other military vehicles were lined up and ready to go.

Here I am in my woodland camo outfit that "the guys" put together for me. And, there is the awesome Jeep I got to ride in--with the HUGE gun! The man driving the Jeep I was in was one of our volunteers, Glen. He is a really neat man and a WWII veteran, so he has a lot of good stories. We sure turned quite a few heads driving over to Jerome with our line of about three Jeeps, a troop transport truck, and a Humvee.

Here we are getting ready for the parade to start. We had people dressed as soldiers from all different eras--French and Indian War, Civil War, World War II, Vietnam, and present-day. It was really cool! The parade was about two miles long and went through the neighborhoods of Jerome. It was so neat--people were lined up along the streets or sitting on their porches. It was all very patriotic and a great way to begin the 4th of July weekend. Happy 4th of July tomorrow!