Cousin Time

Cousin time is always one of the best parts of these trips.

These 6 got to see a lot of each other and came up with all types of fun during the week.

They spent a big chunk of one evening doing art.

while this monkey told me all about the treasure hunt she was on and where she was going to find the treasure at the end, and then she somehow managed to hijack the hammock from me so I got to see all the fun tricks she could do on that, haha.

We went hiking to Gloria Falls which was a fantastic, not-too-long-with-a-good-reward hike.

The Boys

Cutest little hiker :)

R LOVED Daddy-o's beard--like, she couldn't stop petting it. It was hilarious.

My girl, who isn't so little anymore.

Bridges are one of my favorites on hikes.

Maybe just because they usually mean there is water, and I love a hike near water. This was a good one for sure.

The kids also put together a puppet show, complete with a playbill, the first night we got together at Rara's house.

They made a ticket booth and were so excited to charge money for the show. We had to dig around to find lots of quarters.

And then, our last day with family, was the 4th of July. It was crazy hot--perfect for a water balloon fight and games in the yard after dinner.

Some of the adults didn't stay in the safe zone, haha

 

They ended with a few rounds of Duck, Duck, Goose, which may not have been a great idea. 

It started off as all fun, and the sprinkles felt great.

But not all the "gooses" enjoyed the dump. There were some tears, but all was forgiven in the end.

As always, we leave wishing that we lived closer and that we could see all our family more often. If only we could carve out the state of Nevada. . .

Best 3rd of July EVER

I'm skipping so many things right now, but on the way home last night, Peanut asked if I took any pictures of their day and if I'd be blogging about it because it was his favorite 3rd of July ever🤣. How could I not jump right on. And so, even though the pictures are few and not great, here's our first 4th of July celebration of the year.

We spent the day at Daddy-o's brother's house. This was the only day we got to see these cousins on this trip and the kids made it count! Swimming, volleyball, video games, NERTS and Scum, space battles, fireworks, and more swimming to finish off the night.

They had some family friends over as well and the 13 year old played with Peanut for a couple hours--building spaceships from wooden shapes and then having battles. Peanut LOVED it, and then roped his dad into playing with him for a couple more hours after his new friend had to leave.

Once it started getting dark, we started the firework show.  

Started with the small stuff and then worked our way up.

 A lot of locations banned them this year because of the fire hazard with the drought, but ironically, if you live in a more urban area, they were allowed, so we were good to go. Only houses to burn in this area!

There were fireworks going off from the blocks all around us at the same time, and the kids were running back and forth from the front yard to watch ours to the back to see a couple other amateur shows. 

I couldn't capture them--just their voices--but this pretty much sums up almost an hour of fireworks. So much joy, and Peanut picked up his older cousin's screams of excitement and was very happy to join in.

They were on the trampoline by the pool at the end and it didn't take long before they all ended up in the water. I think the adrenaline high from swimming at 11 o'clock after all the excitement of the evening blew Peanuts mind. They were all so insanely happy, and it's so fun to see that after such a LONG time of being apart.

Thankful Gathering

This year, Thanksgiving was with Daddy-o's family, hosted by Jake and Kim. It's kind of amazing how many cousins we can amass in one house for these dinners! That right there is 4 families of offspring--pretty impressive :)

The guys--lot of beards in this group.

The pies--because of course that's the best part of the meal. Although there was a lot of other good food, too--I just didn't think to take a picture of the rest of the spread. But we had smoked turkey, siracha ham, and all the fixings for a Thanksgiving dinner, and then a cheesecake and 6 pies, haha.

These two pie serving brothers are also the master bakers. We don't suffer from a lack of good desserts, that's for sure.

The kids (and adults) had so much fun with the tablecloth before the meal. Between that, and pulling out almost every toy in all 3 kids' bedrooms, kept them busy for hours. They even got outside for a little while, despite the drizzle and cold temps.

All in all, it was a really nice day with family. So grateful that we get to spend these holidays together.

Our Thanksgiving week school also took on a festive spin. We did a virtual turkey nature study class and Bug blew us away with his turkey anatomy sketch (and impressed the teacher, too!) 

This was our first class from this instructor, but we have a 3 month membership and I'm excited about the classes she has available--lots of seasonal nature studies.

We also read the book Cranberry Thanksgiving, which was a new one for us and a cute story, and then made the cranberry bread recipe on the back. I'm not usually too hopeful for recipes that are included in a picture book like this, but this bread was AMAZING!

Cranberry Bread

2 c sifted flour

1 cup sugar

1 1/2 tsp baking powder

1 tsp salt

3/4 tsp baking soda

3/4 c butter

1 egg, beaten

1 tsp grated orange peel

3/4 c orange juice

3 c cranberries (fresh or frozen), chopped (one bag of fresh)

Sift dry ingredients into large bowl. Cut in butter until mixture is crumbly. Add egg, orange peel, and juice all at once; stir just until moist. Fold in cranberries.

Spoon into a greased 9 x 5 x 3 in. loaf pan. Bake at 350 degrees for 70 minutes, until toothpick comes out clean (or bake as muffins, about 25-30 minutes).

We also played a dice game to celebrate the leaves changing colors. I was trying to squeeze in a little holiday school fun, along with all the scout stuff that pretty much took over November.

This year, I'm grateful for so many things, but especially my family and the time that I get to spend with them. While it's not always fun and games, and there is plenty of frustration and tempers flairing, I'm so grateful for the years of homeschooling with both quantity and quality time together. I'm thankful for the moments I get to sneak away with one of my kids, and that I had the idea to make monthly dates with each of my family members a real goal--it's been fabulous! I'm thankful for those quiet times, though few and far between, when Daddy-o and I get to have an uninterrupted conversation. I'm thankful for the craziness that happens whenever we're all together (even though I end up having to cut it short because I just can't take any more noise, haha.) This family of mine is pretty great and I don't want to take for granted that we get these years all together because they are rapidly coming to a time of big changes and longer times apart. 

Goodbye, 2018

We had some help celebrating this year--Daddy-o's parents and his brother's family came for the evening, which filled our house with music, games, laughter, and so much food.

With one last party this season, we've now seen all the CA siblings.

The kids spent the evening playing Mario Kart, Tenzi, and making movies.

All these cousins! 

We even got to celebrate this guys 18th birthday--the lucky New Year's Eve baby!

Our kids were really happy to have a captive audience for all the movies they've made this last week.

As always, a cousin line-up. Maybe sometime I'll pull out all the line-ups from over the years and we can see them together. It would be fun to see the kids grow (and see the height differences change--some of the girls have been passed up by the younger ones.)

 

And the silly picture.

It was a good end to a pretty good year. Lots to be grateful for, lots to reflect on, lots to learn from and hopefully grow from in 2019.

Over the River

And through the woods, To Grandmother's house we go!

When we realized that the kids had the whole week off at Thanksgiving, we thought it would be fun to spend the holiday in Utah with family and friends.

And fun it was! We shopped, saw friends, hung out with all our Utah family, ate great food, and played lots of games.

We were able to squeeze in the Museum of Curiosity at Thanksgiving Point with friends one afternoon. We'd been there once a few years ago and the kids were excited to go back.

It's a fun place, with so much to experience and do. (Hang like a sloth, anyone?)

(I can't believe Bug was able to build this without anyone destroying it. Of course, right when he was about to wreck it while we filmed in slow motion, a kid DID come through and destroy it, but I was surprised that didn't happen every minute or two as he tried to build it.)

Thanksgiving day meant lots of food prep. I had come down with a pretty bad cold on the drive out (it was as if my body knew that I was slowing down and ready for a week of no responsibilities and no stress, so perfect time to be out of commission), so I stayed out of the way and let me kids step in. 

And they did a great job! It was fun watching them work with my mom and brother (and Daddy-o did all the pies, of course).

Peanut even helped with setting the table.

We had a great afternoon with my whole family--they all have Thanksgiving together every year, but I don't think we have been around for it since the year we got engaged.

Codenames is the perfect game for a big group with a big age span.

We had a lot of fun with some of the "connections" people were trying to make.  

This sweet little baby was teething and not having as much fun as most of us, poor thing. But we had a few happy moments playing together.

Friday was our last day and we were able to fit in visits with more friends (some of our favorite neighbors from Charlotte!)

and another round of cousins at their new house. We now have my whole family and two of Daddy-o's siblings who live in Utah.

And then Saturday morning, we woke to this! Not what we were hoping to drive home in. I started having flashbacks to February when the same thing happened as I was trying to leave with the kids and we had a very miserable first part of our trip.

But this time, the roads weren't quite as bad, and Daddy-o did the driving so I didn't have to panic :) 

All in all, it was a great week. I keep saying it, but we are so glad we get to see our families more often--we're pretty lucky with the people we are related to!