Fourth of July

Our fourth of July was just exhausting! We drove to spend the day with Dave's side of the family. We don't get together very much so it's always new for the kids. This time there were three (yes 3!!) new babies. The next generation is growing so quickly.

Dave comes from a large family--7 kids all together. Between them they have 20 children--Analiese is the youngest of all of these kids, the oldest is 38! So, the "kids" are now having children and between them they have 12 children (that is only from 6 of the kids--some of the others are not yet married!).

Needless to say it was a full house even though not everyone was there! The kids played and played and then played some more. Oh, not only did they play they ate and ate and ate, until they could eat no more! It was a fun day and we sure wish the kids could see their family more often.

As you can see from the photos, ALL of the kids crashed on the way home. The best part was that we had silence for the first time in HOURS! When we got home we set off some fireworks but the best was from our neighbor who puts on a pretty good amateur show!

This was Matthew's first fourth holiday and of course he doesn't yet understand how fortunate he is to be a US citizen. But he will, he will most certainly come to see how his life and future was changed that day in November, 2008 when he walked into that conference room in Fujian, China.