4th of July, Niamey style

Many people ask us some peculiar questions at times. One of those we often get, "Is there a 4th of July in Africa?" Now, I pause here for two reasons....1...well of course there is a fourth of July, how would they get from the third to the fifth? 2. Do all countries celebrate America's birth? silly I know, but it just sounds funny to us who live in a culture that has different holidays than the ones to which we are accustomed. I digress. I do want to share some photos of our celebration of the fourth of July. We do try to celebrate our American and Canadian holidays when it is possible. We don't get the days off here, but we do what we can. We started the day by playing a game of softball in the heat of the afternoon...Yes, we are crazy Americans. There is Janice making a diving catch in right field.
About 5:30 in the afternoon, we all went to Brian and Cathy Blisses house for a good ole barbeque. We had some hamburgers and hot dogs and even played some crochet. How American is that? Funny thing was that some of the tenns here had no clue what this silly game was. Others just loved it, it reminded them of their childhood.
Once darkness was upon us, we found some sparklers for the kids to play with. Our kids weren't too sure at first. In fact, Mikaylah refused to touch one until she saw how much fun everyone was having with them, then she joined in. When it first lit up, she would almost drop it out of fear, then she would have some fun as you can see in her pictures.
Jayson was the same way. It was a bit nervous of them, but then wanted to hold it, but where it was burning:) Aside from that, it was a Saturday as usual, or was it Friday? Other activities some did was to pick some great looking Mangos, ride on Rover, the campus turtle, and sit around and eat. We had just a wonderful time. Thank you Blisses for putting that together for us.