Fourth of July 2016

This past Monday we celebrated our fifth Fourth of July since we moved to America. I still can't believe that we've been here for almost five years! All three of my girls have now spent more time living in America than they have in Australia. 

Like we've done in the past we spent the afternoon at the festival held at Berkeley Marina. Before we headed down to the marina the girls played construction workers and built the White House. No, not out of Lego or blocks, but out of cookies! I couldn't resist when I saw this White House cookie kit at Trader Joe's. Just like a gingerbread house for Christmas! It doesn't look quite as nice as the real thing but it sure does look tasty!

Fourth of July in Australia

This year we celebrated Fourth of July with a big party at my parents' house in Adelaide, South Australia. Even though we were out of the country we still wanted to celebrate America's birthday with our little American girl. Plus it seemed like a great excuse to throw a big party with friends and family!

Despite the fact that it's Winter here in Australia, we were lucky to have a great day weather wise. Not quite the Summery weather we're used to for Fourth of July, but the sun was shining and the rain stayed away. Perfect for a back yard party.  

DIY: Hand Coloured Wired Head Scarves

I've been feeling a little behind the ball lately when it comes to crafting and getting creative. Trust me, I've been trying but the combination of the two big girls home ALL DAY and Mathilde keeping me up at nights is starting to get to me. Ok, it's not "starting" to get to me, it's been dragging me down for weeks.

When Fourth of July rolled around again for another year it really hit me just how behind I've been getting with my crafting. Usually I'd be working on something red, white and blue for the girls to celebrate the day with but there was none of that this year. No hand print flags, no fireworks crafts, no confetti rockets... Ok, I did set the bar a little high last year! Anyway, after a few hours away from the kids on the eve of the Fourth (time off to take a diabetes test - all clear), my brain was feeling a little less frazzled and I came up with a relatively quick and easy craft project to work on with the big girls to show a little American spirit. After all, I couldn't let my American daughter's first ever Fourth of July go past without making something red, white and blue.

So here it is, my quick and easy craft project: Hand coloured wired head scarves.

Kid Friendly Fireworks

4th of July is almost here again. Just four more days away.

We had originally thought that we'd be spending this 4th of July holiday in Canada waiting for our new visas to be issued. As it turns out, the recent floods in Calgary (where we were booked in for our visa appointment) caused the US Consulate to close down for over a week - right when our visa appointment was booked. For now we're waiting to hear back from the consulate with a new visa appointment. Unless the consulate can squeeze us in early this week (and we can manage to rebook flights, accommodation and car hire at such short notice), it looks like we'll be here in Berkeley to celebrate 4th of July. 

In preparation for celebrating 4th of July the girls and I spent this afternoon up on our roof deck creating some red, white and blue crafts.

Our projects for today: kid friendly fireworks...

Ava with one of her fireworks creations