My Awesome Family's Reunion

I took this picture at the bowling alley.  This is my first (and so far my only) Grand Nephew (Peter).
I got to hold him for a few minutes while his parents were bowling.  He doesn't look
really happy here, but he is a very good natured baby!

This is Uncle Jeff.  I think that bush will grow better now that it has been hugged properly.
As a part of our reunion we did some service for our hosts.  Work is a lot faster and a lot more fun
when you have lots of workers for good company!

Saturday was Uncle Ray's birthday.  Here we are singing.  Connor looks especially fine.  He is holding his new Panda Carl which was gifted to him by his cousin Lauren.  He loves Pandas!  You can also see my Dad and Kayli.  Ray's birthday hat was donated by my brother Brian.  It was a nice touch.

Ray is examining his candles because we got the trick kind, and he was waiting for them to relight -- again.
 My Dad and Lori and Dan are all waiting for that too.

Ray is opening his presents.  It was a party!

There were many things I didn't get a picture of -- naturally.  You don't see my kids partying with their cousins until really late at night.  You don't see their Aunts and Uncles somehow managing to be very good natured without having had much sleep.  You don't see us telling stories (each family was to share one) or singing songs (again one per family).  And, though we were heading into a late night before an early church, we had a puppet activity (thanks to the insistence of the group that it not be skipped).  It was SOOO funny.

I am usually in all of the puppet shows, and so I don't often get to watch them.  This time I did!  I laughed very hard.  I wish you could have seen Dan being Darth Vader with the wolf puppet, and his cousin Caleb being Luke Skywalker with the owl puppet.  Dan is very dramatic and the wolf puppets mouth, with Dan's voice, said "LUKE, I am your Father!" and the owl flaps its wings and says "NO!!!".  Then Dan says some other dramatic line, and suddenly breaks into fits of giggles that send us all into fits of giggles too.  All the shows were really great, but I think I laughed hardest at that one.  I also like how, when Derek asked for volunteers, my Grand Niece Lorien went running towards him yelling "Puppets!"

Also not pictured is Jenny and Jeff going to 3 different stores and buying lots of blow up floaties, and then blowing them all up with a pump so that we could go down a stretch of river over and over.  It was so relaxing and such fun that we stayed a little longer than planned.

It is hard to put in a picture just how nice everyone is, or what good company they are. They are all such good people.  I have an awesome family -- and I am glad we had a reunion.