I Suck At 4th Of July Cookouts

Happy 4th of July!

In what seems to be yet another consecutive weekend spent north of Boston, Karen, my fifteen month old daughter (Briana), and I went to the All-America city known as Lowell. After all, there is a lot to like about Lowell, or so the city would have you believe.

Karen's cousin (Karlene) and Karlene's husband (Tommy) were hosting a 4th of July cookout. Too bad I suck at 4th of July cookouts. In previous years, Karen and I had gone to Lowell for the 4th of July via the town of Chelmsford. Why Chelmsford? Apparently, Chelmsford has an annual road race on the 4th of July, which is then followed by a parade. And for those people who know Karen, they know that she loves parades. Me, not so much.

As much as I would have loved to run the road race this year (or run in general for that matter), we met up with Karlene and Tommy for the cookout portion of the day. Karlene and Tommy's friends, some of whom attended the Chelmsford festivities, were also going to the cookout. It was nice because we had not seen them in quite some time.

Anyway, as usual it was a good time. Karlene and Tommy did a fantastic job as hosts despite the freakish showers. I was probably most impressed with Karlene and Tommy's friends' kids, who were so well behaved. They seemed to enjoy playing with Briana a lot. Of course, Briana does also tend to ham things up when she gets attention. So maybe that was why.

All in all, it was a fun time. I actually tried a belini for the first time, complements of Karlene and Tommy's friend (Kim). I normally don't like champagne, but the peach made it more interesting.