A 4th of July Breakfast Tradition, Well, Sort Of.

For year now, the Signs family has had a favorite tradition to commemorate the call for American Independence, the Revolutionary War and subsequent victory that ensured our liberty.  That tradition, is a fabulous 4th of July breakfast followed by a water fight - well, a water war really, between the kids and the adults.

However, this year it turned out that we spent the 4th of July in San Diego, so we thought we would have to forgo the tradition this year.  Well, the kids were gravely disappointed at the thought of not getting to stick it to the parents this year.  So we decided that we would have our traditional 4th of July breakfast for Family Home Evening Monday night - thus the 4th breakfast, turned out to be dinner on the 6th.  Close enough, right?

The War was ON again!

The kids were so excited!  They spent the afternoon building up their arsenal - stockpiling all the water guns they could find into their playhouse.  Then they concentrated on the ammo - water balloons of course.  They sure filled a lot, but I think they broke most of them while training at target practice.

Finally it was dinner time, therefore, time for breakfast!  Mom made the brown sugar bacon and Lisa scrambled the eggs, while Dennis manned the waffle irons.  We have a traditional big round waffle iron, but the demand was for my parents rectangle waffles because the kids discovered that they could make flag waffles with blueberries for the star field, whipped cream and strawberries for the stripes, and a strip of bacon for the flag poll.  Clever kids!  I bet THAT will be a tradition now too!

After our delicious breakfast/dinner, we were all ready for a fight.  NOT!  Well, the kids were all ready for a fight - chanting their war cries and rallying behind their self-designed battle flag, while the adults could do nothing but sit and watch episode after episode of The Revolution documentary I recorded from the History Channel while we waited for our food to digest.  Finally, the adults relented, realizing that war really was our only option.  We stormed their fortress, took some of their weapons, and the battle began in earnest!

War is rough!  I have no pictures of the battle because my camera would certainly have been the first causality.  I wish I could have snapped a few shots though, because it was hilarious!  The fighting was fierce.  Father against daughter, mother against son, grandparent against grandchild.  Heart wrenching to see a family so torn apart by the ravages of water war.

After a while we realized that Dennis was not in the fray.  That seems to be another tradition.  Dennis always seems to disappear when the battle begins.  He was in the backyard this time, cleaning the grill, when we all - adults and children alike, lit into him at once, completely soaking him as he just stood there, hunched over, trying to protect his face from the constant torrent of water.  He really was pathetic, but he deserved it!  

The battle lasted a good 45 minutes, but when we called it quits, Dylan was very upset.  "Already!?"  He had planned to fight for a good 2 hours!  He thought we were wimping out after only 45 minutes.  Whew!  I could not have lasted that long.  Poor Dylan.

So we had our traditional 4th of July breakfast and water fight after all, because nothing should come between a family and a great tradition!