July 29th- August 2nd
This year the reunion was in Pacific City, Oregon. SO MUCH FUN. I love the beach. We stayed in three houses. One was right on the beach, one that was yellow and in the middle of town on a little hill, and the other (ours, the biggest that could sleep 25+) was on a big hill looking over the whole town.
Day 1
On the way to Oregon we made a quick detour to the temple in Portland to show the girls where we got married! The temple and the grounds were closed :,( but the girls loved to see it. It is so beautiful! I love it so much!
My Aunt LeeAnn was in charge of the reunion and she got 3 rental houses for the families (we are a HUGE fam). This is the view from our house. AWESOME! Funny side note.... Spencer and I got to town before anyone was there. Check in was at 4 but we took our time and got there at about 5. NO ONE was in town yet, so Spencer and I waited around for about 2 hours until some fam got there. It was ok though, we went shopping at the grocery store and found all the houses. It didn't take long to see the town. It was TINY. but so cute and pretty. After everyone got there, we checked out two of the houses (3rd one was going to be available the next day, when the reunion actually started). Well, it was pretty late, so Spencer and I left to make sure the place where we were all going to eat was open.... nope! So Spencer and I found this cute little place called the Delicate Palate. It was good food. The owner was so nice! He gave the girls some ice cream and when Spencer got his food it was kinda gross-he though it was something different-so the owner let him change the dish for free. After dinner he showed us around the restaurant. He was an old British guy and loved to talk. It was a really nice time.
DAY 2
The rest of the family was going to be showing up later in the day so we just had a lazy day. Some of the family went to a cool-and yummy- bakery called The Greatful Bread (cool name huh!). After my family went to Cape Kiwanda beach (and got our car stuck in the sand!), and just had a good time. It was way too cold to swim, but we had fun looking for shells and putting our feet in the ocean. After everyone got there, and the 3rd house was available, we had a hot dog roast and just visited with family.
DAY 3
We had breakfast at the individual houses, had lunch together at Bob Straub Park and some of the family went on a hike... kinda it was too hard so they turned back. We didn't go on the hike so Spencer and the girls went back to the house to nap and my mom, Aunt Shannon, and I went shopping at some of the shops in town. For dinner we got back together and spent some more time talking. ( don't have some pics from that, but other family does...)
DAY 4
This was the last full day of the reunion. It was kind of a free day. We got together for lunch and family pictures and after my family (parents and bro and sis and her fam) went to Tillamook to see the the air museum and the cheese factory! A LONG time ago, when my family used to live in Longview, we went to the air museum and Tillamook factory. The air museum is in an old HUGE blimp hanger. Its pretty cool. We tried to take reenactment picture of when we were there years ago. It was pretty funny. At the cheese factory we tried the awesome squeeky cheese and we were going to take a reenactment picture there, but they renovated the place and got rid of the huge cow they had there, so we took a family picture in the little car they had.
After Tillamook, we went back to the yellow house and had haystacks and played some games. One game was a pick the ending game. It was stories from Grandma and Grandpas younger years. It was fun to hear their stories!....."Perditto!" ;) ...Another game was a word search that my Grandpa put together of every ones name. We also did the traditional candy toss! This year, we had a family member that was alergic to peanuts so no peanut m&ms this time but HI Chews... YUM! After the festivities, we headed back to our rentals to pack, and do some crafts. My mom, cousins Makaela and Kendal, and I stayed up WAY too late crafting and laughing at very random thing! So fun though :)
DAY 5
The reunion was over so we headed on home to good ole Moses Lake. On the way home we made a stop at Multnomah Falls. So pretty!
It was a fun reunion and I cant wait til next years! I loved seeing family! Love you all and hope more of you can make it next year! Thanks Aunt LeeAnn and Uncle Brian for a great time!
