Jolly Hollidays in Preston 2015

My dad planned a family reunion for all his siblings and their kids for the week we happened to be in Utah!  We were originally planning on going down to Zion and then up to visit family but once we found out it was the same week as the Preston reunion we talked to the kids one on one and asked each of them what they would rather do and they all without skipping a beat chose Preston (well, Levi was a little torn since he loves adventures like his momma and he'd never been to Zion, but the draw of family and the farm/campground was too much to resist so he chose Preston, too).

I think its safe to say that they all are more than happy with the choice they made!  We had a fabulous time!  We drove up on Wednesday and were greeted by my dad's two sisters and his brother along with all of brood.  Not to mention my awesome brother Richy who was so kind to travel with 5 kids solo while his fabulous wife was at girl's camp with their 12 year old daughter.

None of my dad's generation camped with us, but Richy and his kids, my cousins Katie and Jill with all their kids and my cousins Anne and Marissa all stayed the night.  Between the four of us that have children we had 22 kids under 15 there!  In fact only two of the kids were over 10!  My kids were in HEAVEN!!!

Add to that heaven a litter of kittens in the ditch and you have a recipe for a perfect campout in the eyes of these poor deprived children.

The wagon continues to be the best toy ever invented.

Katie brought some sparklers to share!  It happened to be Preston's celebration week so fireworks were totally legal (I guess).

We set up our tents and put sleeping bags in them and then the kids all decided that they were going to sleep with cousins.  I was worried that no one would get any sleep but I think they did pretty well.  We got up in the morning and started making breakfast.  Richy found this gigantic bug just inside the pavilion.  It was quite a site for the kids to see. For a frame of reference this is one of those big 16 oz red plastic cups that is in.

Traveling with Richy is so easy.  He almost always takes care of the food and he feeds us sooooo well!  He made yummy pancakes and eggs for breakfast.  He even made blackberry syrup!  Bryant has his mom's butterfingers grip and dumped 3/4 of it out but we enjoyed what we could of it.  Jonas thought it looked like blood... Oh, my kids are so silly.

Bryant's mishap landed in Porter's lap so we hosed down his clothes the rest of the time we were there.  Katie's dog, Cinnamon, was soooo funny!  He would bark at and try to bite the stream of water from the hose.  We laughed so hard at that silly dog!

The kids had so much fun just wandering through the farm/campground.  It was so nice to just let them be free and happy.  Sometimes I wish we lived in a world where kids could have a childhood like I did or even better, like my parents did.

These two boys caught a tiny mouse in a field.  It was pretty exciting.

Richy, game designer extraordinaire invited us to play one of his games and it was fun!  Except that little stinker Porter totally prevented me from winning and I was SO close!!!

It has been YEARS!!! since I've seen Jill.  What a treat to see her and her wonderful family!

Poor Porter really wanted to play games more and his mean Auntie Kim is such a party pooper.  Hopefully he'll still like me!  I sure love him.  He just hung out with the grown ups for the most part while we were there.

Even though Grandpa had bought the kids swim suits I didn't bring them with us to Preston and we regretted that.  But thankfully we had enough clothes that they could get one set soaked in the sprinkler!

Bryant didn't get wet, but rather played bocce.  Doesn't he look dapper?

As the sun set we had a rowdy game of 500.  It was so fun to see all these kids just have so much fun together.

As you can see the kids were pretty wiped out by the end of the day.  Katie is a champ with three of her six all sleeping on her.  She's going to be flying solo while her hubby deploys soon.  Say a prayer for her, I know I'd need all the prayers I could get.

Friday morning the kids all sat around the fire pit and talked.  Its kind of strange to have kids that will just sit and talk with other kids.  I guess they're growing up!  We got to hang out until late afternoon Friday and then we headed back to Ethan's parent's house.  Ethan had a big night ahead...