Idaho reunion

My in-laws all live very close to us.  The furthest away is in Salt Lake City, and the most south is Provo.  All seven siblings get together on a very regular basis, depending on what is going on.  Maybe a month or so will go by without seeing someone, but that is rather rare.  This summer hasn't been as much, since my Mother-in-law moved and hasn't been hosting her usual dinners, but we see them a lot in general.

My family, on the other hand, rarely sees each other.  My parents make trips to see everyone every year or so.  One brother in Cleveland rarely travels, and one in Las Vegas has a large family (plane tickets get expensive very fast), so I can count on one hand the "reunions" in the last twenty years.  Grandpa Dance's funeral had 5 of the 6 children, a wedding in 2008 had all 6, graduations in 2000 had 5 and then a different 5, but never all 6, and Christmas of 1995 was all 6 siblings.

I'm so glad that my oldest brother offered to host all of us at his house in Idaho for the week.  All 6 made it!  Look- proof I have 5 brothers!

It was a lot of people on one property, but it honestly didn't feel as crowded as I thought it might.

We drove our trailer up, and there were two more trailers parked on his RV pads for other families to use.  I have heard stories about his place for years, so it was great to finally see it.  I am totally jealous that he has a local person that takes care of the property for him.  His grass was immaculate and plush, and this year our grass at the cabin appears dead because we were too busy to get up there and water it.  The house is great, our RV pad was better than almost any RV park we've stayed at, and the river was wonderful.

Most of the cousins are older than my children.  Kaitlyn is the only one that had a cousin her age, and they were truly inseparable.  I hardly saw them apart the entire week we were there.

Tyler might not have had a cousin his age, but he does have a much older cousin with Autism.  Nathan was really sweet with him, and taught him how to play the video games he had with him.

Tyler also spent as much time as he could with the dogs.

And Jasmine just enjoyed the attention from all of the babysitting-age cousins that liked to play with her.

Most people went fly fishing in the river.

Kaitlyn really wanted to join them, but she was just too small and light.  The current would have whisked her downstream!  So they got to play in the riverbank instead.

My brother has a lot of four-wheelers, with tracks all over his property to zip around on.

One day, I went with a group on a long four-wheeling trip while Christopher took the kids to Craters of the Moon, a National Park nearby.

Most of the trail was a regular road, but the last section was a fun climb up some rocky areas with a few small water crossings.

The kids loved Crater of the Moon!  I'll have to go check that place out myself some day.  Looks like an odd place.

Christopher took his turn later in the week.

We took a short lived boat trip, too.  There is a lake nearby, but the water was pretty cold, and one of the boats wouldn't start.

So we went for ice cream instead.

All five of my brothers and a good portion of their families love competitive sports.  I went to a lot of football and soccer games growing up, and now we are a family that fills downtime with games.  There was badminton, soccer goals, bocce ball, and especially KanJam, a Frisbee game that was probably the most popular that week.  Not to mention a few trips to the golf course.

There was also a campfire every evening.

The only thing our cabin has going for it above my brother's is that our smoke from the firepit always blows exactly one direction.  The cold air comes down the canyon each night, and that means you never have smoke changing direction and getting in your face.  Since some people didn't like the smoke in their eyes, they found a creative solution.

We had a lot of good laughs around that fire!

We took a walk one day with Grandma and Grandpa to a very old cemetery they found.

Kaitlyn and Megan were testing how long they could stay there without getting wet.

So pretty!

We got to see a fantastic fireworks show that a group of neighbors pool together for.

Christopher spent hours chopping wood for the woodpile with everyone.  The pile was huge!

Our kids were thrilled to feed a baby calf at their neighbor's farm.

And at the end of the week, there was a parade for the ATV convention in town that weekend.

There was a contest for the best decorations on them, and some people really went all out!

My kids loved all of the candy and hats they tossed out.

We even played with perler beads in some downtime.

What an amazing week!  I hope we get to go again some day.