Post Dated Post

I finally posted pictures about our family reunion over Labor Day weekend (scroll down to see the slide show it is post dated to Sept. 9th). My family has gone every year since I can remember to this reunion which id for my Great Grandma and her cousins and siblings. We call it the Big Dirty and Zane loved getting to play in the dirt and not get in trouble. Nate did really well and both boys slept all night every night. We ended up leaving on Friday afternoon and coming home really late on Monday night. Zane started getting sick with a fever on Thursday and still had it until Saturday. This made him very shy toward people he doesn't see all the time. Saturday, they had kids games, but Zane decided they were to scary for him. After lunch we went to ride Grandpa's horse Paint. Zane was afraid at first, but then cried every time we took him off the horse. Saturday night was the big potluck. After dinner, they had a karaoke machine. Someone convinced Dad and his brothers to sing Sweet Home Alabama. Halfway through, three of my aunts decided to get up and be back up dancers. It was quite a site. On Sunday, it started raining at about 4:45 am (we know since we were up with Nate) and really rained all day. It rained out the family testimony meeting and adult business meeting. My sisters and I and our husbands and Randall decided to go out looking for elk, shooting and mud bogging. My brother-in-law, Jason, has a tag for an elk, so we went to his hunt area. We didn't see any elk but had to stop and shoot at every jack rabbit the boys saw. Julie, Bret, Randall and Mike were in the Jeep and Christi, Jason, Jayden, Nate and I were in the truck. Julie and I never got out to shoot anything, so we gave running commentary over the walkie-talkies. It was really fun. By the end, it was pouring and we did a pretty good job getting the cars muddy. Julie and I had to laugh at everyone's bad shots and joked about how many guys it tookt o shoot a rabbit. The answer? We don't know, no one ever hit one, but not for a lack of trying. Sunday night, we had a fabulous dinner of steak, dutch oven biscuits, fried potatoes and onions and peach cobbler. After dinner, we roasted marshmallows, put the kids to bed and played games.

Julie, Josh, Steve and Jason shucking corn into the truck so Grandpa can take the cobs and shucks to the horses

Monday we cleaned up and then the boys and Christi went shooting and the rest of us went in to put up corn at Grandma and Grandpa's. It is a tradition that every year families order corn and then we all shuck, silk, and blanch the corn, then cut it off the cob and put it in bags to freeze and enjoy throughout the year. It is a fun way to get a lot of work done quickly, while distracted by good company and good conversation. We were supposed to stay in Snowflake until Tuesday, but decided to come home late Monday night. The boys slept on the way home, which made the trip much easier. Tuesday we were able to do laundry, relax, swim and spend time as a family before Mike had to go back to work. It was a wonderful weekend and we are already looking forward to next year.

(Thank you to Marti for the pictures, I stole them off her blog.)

Jeff, Kristi, Kelli, Nicole, Randa, Grandpa and Nic cutting the corn off the cobs and bagging itJulie and Grandma Brewer were silking the corn and Dad blanched the cornJayden and Cooper enjoying sweet corn. Yummy!