As much as we were going to miss being at Grandma's and Poppop's, we were excited to have a visit from Taylor as soon as we got home! Since she has the summer off from teaching she decided to come visit us for a few days and it was a total blast. Rory loved all the attention and the adventuring. One of the things we were able to do on her visit was volunteer at Feed My Starving Children, which is a place that packs donated meals to ship to countries in need. It was so much fun and such a cool experience to get to do it together. We watched a lot of Rom Coms and ate a lot of good food, so it was overall an extremely successful visit. Now we just can't wait for her wedding in April!
After Taylor left town it was time for Rory and I to head to Moses Lake for some time with my family. This was one of Rory's very last flights as a lap child and can I get quick Hallelujah for that! I always take a picture for Stephen in the few minutes that she's being wonderful and I feel so happy about life and then everything slowly disintegrates to crap and by the time we land everyone is like, "Just get them off the plane!" But we did it. And we made it to Moses Lake safely.
Rory loved being at Grammy and Grandpa's house and especially loved all of the cousins to play with, not to mention my mom's cat Joe, who sadly died during our visit of kitty Leukemia :(. What she loved most was chasing the boys around and trying to join in on whatever they were doing. Rory and Quinn have a tenuous friendship at best, but someday they are going to be a lot less interested in making each other miserable and boy, do I look forward to that day.
Also, I had to include the picture of cupcakes I made for my cousin Tyler's birthday because they turned out so beautiful and so delicious. But sad story, we brought my perfect cupcakes to eat at Grandma's pool and the heat and the travel did not do them any favors so my once-beautiful cupcakes required bribery to even be tried. But really, they were exceptional.
Before we left for the reunion we took the kids to the aquatic center for some old fashioned Moses Lake fun. I was so excited thinking Rory would just LOVE it, but it turns out they keep the water in the pools in Washington a lot colder than they do in Phoenix and she was NOT HAVING IT. I think of all my grown up experiences, watching my daughter play where I used to is by far the trippiest.
The next day we headed out early to make our way to Steadman's Place in Idaho for our early family reunion. Poor planning on my part meant that I had NO IDEA it would be a 9 hour drive from Moses Lake, so needless to say I was under-prepared and totally crabby. Still, it was fun to travel with Courtney and her crew and the kids actually did a really good job.
Steadman's Place is a family owned property with a giant water slide and a couple of other fun little amenities. We drove straight there for dinner after our drive and after the kids had played and slid down the slides a few times we went back to where we had stayed two years previous at the Albion retreat, while some others camped at Steadman's.
The next day we all went back to Steadman's for more sliding and some matching family pictures. It was kind of a blustery day so I never tried out the water slide, but the kids all seemed to have a blast. Grandma Earl even set a record for being the oldest person to go on the water slide, with a little help from Brandon, and it was awesome. Just when I thought she couldn't get any cooler.
I ended up ditching Rory with my mom so that I could drive a few hours down to Utah for my friend Andrea's wedding. I felt a little guilty leaving my mom with Rory until I found out that my dad organized a family volleyball tournament that evening so my mom and Jules were stuck watching all the kids while the rest of the adults played and then I felt REALLY guilty, because heaven knows I wouldn't have made the team.
My drive down was absolutely lovely. I finished my audiobook, listened to the Mama Mia 2 soundtrack and drank Diet Coke, which is about all it takes for me to be happy. Andrea's wedding was in a cool little greenhouse venue and everything was so gorgeous. I also got to reconnect with another friend from my BYU days, Rachel. After the ceremony we enjoyed a nice little dinner and some speeches by the families, and then I made my way back to Idaho before they could whip out the ice cream in the hand made cart.
As I headed back I found out they had closed most of the highway I needed to take due to wildfires, so I drove around crying while I panic called my mom, Stephen, and Courtney, until I finally realized that my best option was to take a longer route that added another hour to my drive. Thankfully, having finished my previous book I decided to start on my book group book for the month, Educated: A Memoir, and the book was so enthralling that by the time I pulled up at the Albion retreat I was wishing that my drive had been longer!
The last day was spent much the same as the first two, lots of chatting with cousins and generally trying to ignore our children. It was also the day of the famous cousin races. I didn't even come close in my age group (who knew Cassidy was so fast?!) but RORY WON THE TWO YEAR OLD DIVISION. I may never be a champion myself, but those who can't do, breed and I made me a winner! Stephen was insanely proud and said it was obviously due to her Marsh genes, which I guess with an Olympic runner in his side of the family that is a fair guess. But seriously, I was an absurd amount of proud for a race that involved the other two competitors running directly into each other and falling to the ground within two seconds of starting the race.
People slowly started leaving so for our last day it was down to mostly our group and Doug's group and a few extras. We were able to be there when Isaac blessed baby Vi and that was a really special thing to witness. I love my extended family and I think more highly of myself because I am related to those people.
I was supposed to fly out Sunday night after driving 9 hours back to Moses Lake, and then an extra 2-3 hours to get to the airport (I forget which one I was supposed to go to), but the thought of having Rory on my lap in an airplane seat after ALL that made me cry, so my parents kindly offered to get me a different return flight back and we got a few bonus days in Moses Lake with the other cousins sticking around.
There was lots of cousin play time and a little dressing up. We got to go out on the boat, which Rory loved, and watch the cousins tube, which Rory wouldn't try. Best of all, we ended the week with scones at Grandma's and all was officially right in my world. Had Stephen been able to come along it would have been a perfect trip, but even without him it was pretty awesome.
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