2013 Family Reunion

Preface
My mom's family has a reunion every year. It's usually across the country so I don't get to go very often, but this year my mom was in charge so it was the perfect excuse to make it happen. Since I was going to be 33 weeks pregnant for it, it took a while to decide we'd go for sure. But we went and I'm so glad we did :)

We flew into Salt Lake City the day before the reunion began and stayed with my uncle in Springville before driving down to Pine Valley for the Reunion the next day. We had lots of fun there and our little guy really enjoyed their pets and playing outside. And he got to spend time with a second cousin that's his age.

The day the reunion ended we drove up to Lehi and stayed with a cousin of mine. My brother & sister & their spouses (who live in Provo) joined us for a bit. Our toddler has two second cousins there, one is his age, and we really enjoyed our time there too.

The next morning we met Hot Cup's brother and his wife for a quick breakfast near the airport before our flight. I'm glad we were able to see them too!

The Reunion
The reunion involved camping for three nights in Pine Valley Utah and 112 of us came for it. I wasn't too sure about camping while being so pregnant so my little family stayed at my grandparents' 45 minutes away in St George. They're 92 and 86 and they camped so I don't know what that says about me; they stayed in my uncle's RV so at least there's that. We left at 8 or 9 each day which unfortunately meant we missed all the evening campfires at the main fire pit. Our toddler napped pretty well in a tent so that was nice. I had to stay in there and lay down too until he fell asleep but I didn't mind.

After Sunday's wonderful Church Service, we prepared for Sunday's Big Family Dinner:
Salmon, Vegetable Skewers, Cubed Fried Potatoes, Salad, and Cobbler. Yum!

Also on Sunday ...

My boys had fun in my brother-in-law's hammock.  I think they could have stayed there forever.  And bonus, it was something relaxing that our boy allowed his daddy to do.


We went down to the river and took the path to the lake.  Switching hats with daddy and playing with rocks were both themes of this trip. 


Finding more rocks at Snow Canyon Overlook:


On the way to my grandparents' to spend the night we stopped at the Snow Canyon Overlook. Beautiful Canyon!



Here are photos of Monday's organized activities.

Thai Massage Instruction with Thai Massage Expert, my oldest sister

Dance Instruction with Dance Expert, my youngest sister
Yes that's my Grandpa in the top right picture :)

Crafts with me and my sister and her husband

The crafts are all owls cause the theme of this year's reunion was wisdom. A booklet was compiled in the lead up to the reunion with advice, wisdom, experiences, etc from members of our family. I keep reading through it, what a neat thing to have!

Bingo MCd by my brother-in-law

Sports with my brother and his wife

Our little guy was quite attached to his daddy. Hot Cup got a little break to play volleyball while I tried to entertain our toddler. Eventually I gave up and sat him down with a bag of chips and Curious George on the iPod so he'd stop asking for his daddy for a little while.


And a couple more pictures of him with his daddy from Monday evening.


Tuesday morning we made a quick trip back to the river.  Our little guy had fun throwing in rocks and playing with bubbles.



And finally, some group pictures.

My mom with her parents and all her siblings.


Me & my siblings.  And me & my siblings and our families.


And here's a couple pictures of my grandparents.  They will celebrate their 69th anniversary this September ♥


Postscript
Every day as we drove to and from the campsite we passed a little pie shop that we couldn't resist, so on the way out on Tuesday we stopped and bought two pies.  Oh yummy!

Counting with daddy on the flight out.

How our little guy did on the flights:

On the way out we woke him up a little after four (ET) so we could get to the airport, so he was tired by the time we arrived in Utah (noon ET).  He did really well considering, but he didn't like not being able to run around.  He played with toys, watched a handful of his shows on the iPod, and asked to be held a lot.  One time I got up to take a little walk down the aisle (per instructions for pregnant ladies on flights) and he wanted to come.  So I said yes and that I was just going on a little walk.  Well, I think calling it a walk confused him cause the rest of the flight he was saying "outside! outside!"

We didn't make the morning flight we'd hoped to on the way back (we were flying standby) but we hadn't waken him up as early for it so that was okay.  We waited around the airport for the evening flight and he had a 2.5 hour nap, which surprised us cause airports aren't exactly his normal napping environment, but we're glad he got the rest!  He asked to watch "1" Curious George and surprisingly didn't ask for a second.  And he didn't watch any shows on the flight.  He did great on the flight home!  It was past bedtime before we landed and he did want to be held the last hour or so but he was very good about it.  While on daddy's lap he enjoyed seeing the city lights from the window.  It wasn't ever dark on our flight out there and he didn't care too much to look out the window then.