The stars aligned again for all of us minus Coders to gather together in Utah for a 24th of July Reunion with Grandma Pam - aaaaand we all got new cute shirts to mark the occasion!
We rolled into town the night before and promptly crashed Quinn's neighborhood Pioneer Day party, the highlights of which were Jett letting me carry him all the way back home and also this exchange:
Neighbor: Oh, hi Quinn and Eden. Your little Leila is sure a cute girl. And a force to be reckoned with - another boy was riding her trike and she sure told him to get off! She's riding around on it now :).
Quinn: Yeah... that's not Leila's trike.
The next morning we all made our way to the starting point of the Temple to Temple 5k. Let's be honest: this year we didn't even try to make it on time - we saw no need to kill ourselves trying to start the race right at 8am with all the crazy running folk. We began our leisurely walk at about 8:50 haha.
Once again, Will did not love the 5k. At all. He did remain on his feet for the whole 3.2 miles this year, so we're calling that a win!
Carma Junie was in pretty good spirits for the whole thing, and loved walking (and finishing!) with Grandma:
Instagram caption: My awesome mama made these shirts for all of us for our family reunion! It’s an excellent charge for life but particularly applicable to the 5k- we were brave to be the last people to start (family tradition of being late everywhere 😳😏) and thus dodge cars along the route as traffic ceased to be blocked 👀😬🚶🏻♀️🚶🏼♂️🚙🚗; we were strong as Eden pushed boys in the stroller that were too big for the stroller (cough, Will and Jack) and Chuck carried Carma on his shoulders pretty much the whole way 🤦🏻♀️💪🏼💪🏼; and Grandma Pam was kind when she informed all of us (okay, mostly Will) that the 5k would be an optional, not required, part of next year’s family reunion 😅🤪😂. #BEbravestrongkind2k18
The four-year-olds:
Aaaaand the six-year-olds.
The next order of the day was to chill out and rest back at Quinner's house - I opted to stare adoringly at Jett for most of that time. He just kills me! He doesn't necessarily look a ton like Quinn when he was little, but his little mannerisms remind me of him.
Carma, Isaac, Jack, and Leila put together a band, which is one of their favorite activities when we're down there - blessedly this time we were favored with an outdoor concert ;).
We all met back up at Sam's to take some group pictures. Sam needed to check the specs on his camera and found a pretty handsome test subject:
... and the resulting picture. Insert allll the heart eye emojis here ;).
Getting 12 kids under 12 to stand nicely and smile for a picture? Easy peasy. Ish.
Grandma Pam and her dozen grandkids - the six girls primarily on the left, the six boys primarily on the right.
Mom graciously invited the adults to join in for a picture as well. And Albie!
We called it good on the photoshoot and headed out on our next adventure: windy, twisty roads up Alpine Canyon to a little spot called......
Silver Lake! We claimed a bit of the rocky beach and sent the children out in various combinations on little rafts:
Will and I did a spot of wandering and exploring and enjoyed some rock-hopping about. He refused to recognize my authority every time I claimed a rock for myself and generally jumped upon it anyway.
We made it back over to the beach in time to discover that two rafts o' children had gotten themselves to the other side of the lake with no real plan or energy to row back to our side. Eden and I jumped into a raft to go rescue them, but Chuck channeled his former swim team days and beat us there... and then proceeded to nonchalantly swim both rafts back to our shore, stealing ALL of the glory Eden and I had hoped to have heaped upon us for rescuing the children. Well, Eden is a good person and was just in it to be helpful. I WAS IN IT FOR THE GLORY.
Clyde with an adorably dirty face and a couple of the landlubbers.
The name of the game Wednesday was Thanksgiving Point with Quinner's family:
First... and hopefully last... time I try the wind tunnel thing. Yiiiikes haha.
The kids found the zipline outside and Chuck offered to help our kids go a bit faster. This generous act quickly caught on and pretty soon Chuck had LOTS of kids lined up to get what Quinn and I christened "the Uncle Chuck Special":
Seriously - doesn't that line remind of you of The Santa Clause when all the kids at the park line up to sit on his lap haha?
Ah yes, the teeter-totter. Let's not focus on how it takes two tween boys to equal me out in weight haha.
Back to Quinn's for lunch! Then we divided and conquered: Eden took a nap to get ready for work, Quinn, Grandma, and Chuck took the older four boys to a movie (ANT MAN AND THE WASP... possibly Clyde's favorite part of the whole family reunion...)...
and I headed back to Thanksgiving Point with Carma, Leila, and Jett!
I definitely got the best end of that deal:
Carma and Leila could have stayed in the little veterinarian area for hours. Oh wait, we did.
Again, this little face and his expressions and his little shy smiles totallllly take me back to when Quinn was the chubby little baby of our family and we all just doted on him ridiculously. Jett is the cutest!
Okay this is random but you know how moms are always like "I wish my husband would take more pictures so that I can actually be in them and my kids will remember me being part of their lives" and so on? Chuck opted to capture this angle after I spilled a water bottle on my lap in the car and deffffffinitely looked like I peed my pants. So grateful to have this moment recorded for posterity.
Wednesday evening found us around the fire pit for some s'mores!
Aaaaand some light saber training with the cousins, of course.
Which led to an orchestrated attack on Quinner:
... which, unfortunately he did succumb to.
I felt slightly guilty at that point and directed the children to an alternative activity, making letters and shapes out of the pool noodles! It did not catch on or provide as many laughs as attacking Quinn, however...
Sibling picture by the fire.... not ominous at all....
This was possibly Carma's favorite part of the reunion: being whisked off to spend the night with Sam and Terri's girls! We love this tradition of our Utah trips.
In an effort to get a bit more use out of Quinner's cool rafts (and to get out of the house and let Eden get more sleep!), we headed back up Alpine Canyon to a little reservoir for some more water fun:
Isaac and Jack did some construction work in the sand:
as did Clyde and Grandma Pam.
The water is not quite as relaxing when Clyde is out and about throwing things haha:
but Mama still managed a peaceful float about.
These pictures bring me great joy haha:
And these bring even a bit more! My boys are pretty lucky to have such a cool, fun dad.
We called it a day at the beach and packed up to head north (after retrieving Carma, of course. But don't think we weren't slightly tempted to leave her - pretty sure it would have taken a couple weeks for her to notice and/or complain...).
We took the Blues up on their perpetual hospitality and crashed with them for the night to break up the drive and get some more cousin time in:
Aaaand Chuck and I sneaked out early the next morning for breakfast with Dan the Man! Dan was in town for a job interview and I'm pretty sure hanging out with us right beforehand was the lucky charm needed, as he did secure the job.
Road trips home = a couple more stops at D.I. which apparently = our yahoo children becoming VERY passionate about working out haha:
Ohhh I love these pictures. One of my favorite things on car rides is how silly the four kids get in the back - Clyde is generally the ringleader and uses random voices and stories to get the other three giggling. I love when the four of them are trapped and use their powers for good and get along instead of fight.
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