Table Top Lake

We spent the entire first day of the family reunion at the lake!  Craig had been talking about renting a jet ski or two, but finally decided our best option was a small speed boat-- it could hold 8 people, as opposed to just 2, so it would be more bang for our buck.  So we began by heading to a marina to get that.  I dropped Craig and the kids off, and then drove about twenty minutes away to where they had a beach and got our stuff all set up there.  

Craig spent the rest of the day driving the boat around and collecting various cousins who wanted to ride in it.  I took a short turn, but mostly was in charge of directing traffic to make sure everyone who wanted a turn got one.  We didn't really have anywhere at the beach to "park" the boat, so Craig would drive up near the swimming area, and then whoever wanted a ride would swim out to the boat.  It was a pain, but it worked.  We'd gotten an inner tube, too, so people could get pulled around, so that was a lot of fun!

Ryder's turn!

Ryder and Camille

Colton and Camille

Kendra

Uncle Cameron, Nicole, and Camille

My cousin Jenna's husband Nick with their son, Hunter

Anne's daughters, Eden and Violet, with Kendra

Colton gets to drive the boat!  (Also, notice all of his and Ryder's sun protection-- we were bound and determined to not let them get sunburned again!!!)

Craig let the kids explore this cool little island

Kendra, Violet, and Oliver

Lorenzo, Camille, Nicole, Anne, and Jasmine

Harper and Cora

Claire and Cora

Cora, Claire, and Harper (these girls were besties and it was so cute!)

Cool Colton (with a duck!)

Meanwhile, back at the beach, I wandered around chatting with cousins I hadn't seen in years and making sure my kids were doing alright.  We'd packed sandwiches and snacks, and when the occasional rain storm blew through we huddled under my pop up until it passed.  

Jenna had gotten three of these lake mats and they were very popular!

My Mom and her brother, my Uncle Bob

At some point, my cousin Trevor rented a jet ski and let us take turns on that, so I got my jet ski fix in!  And finally in the late afternoon everyone decided they were sunburned enough and it was time to head home!

While I was showering, Craig and Cameron got to work making spaghetti and Tracy made garlic bread.  Dinner was so good-- it's amazing what being on the water all day can do for your appetite!  Everyone tucked in and enjoyed the evening.  And the grown ups had ice cream once the kids were in bed!

Such a great kitchen space!

Nolan, London, Cora, Claire (and Camille, barely in view)

Continuing on, you can see Camille, Nicole, and Colton, also!

Enjoying the view from the deck!
Kendra, Mom, Adam, Rachael, Ian, me, Natalie, and Craig (with Colton photobombing in the window!)

St. Louis

I believe it was my cousin Jenna who first suggested we should hold a family reunion with all of the offspring of my maternal grandparents, Bob and Verlie Hansen.  We kicked it around for years, talking about staying at my cousin Anne's house, or going to Bear Lake.  But when Jenna's husband's family held their own reunion in Branson, MO, Jenna decided this would make a great location for us, too.  And suddenly, we were actually picking a year (2026!) and dates (end of June!).  Craig finally buckled down for the Bentley contingent and found a rental house that could accommodate all of us (that was: my mom, four Bentley sisters, their husbands, and 14 of their combined 16 kids; sadly we were missing Leah and her family, Bentley, and Samuel).  It was actually happening!!!

We were lucky, because we could just drive there.  For most of my family, they needed to fly.  But no airports are particularly close to Branson so most people opted to fly through St. Louis and then drive the remaining four hours, which is kind of lame.  Craig joked that we should drive through St. Louis so we could stop by Ted Drewes, but then we actually looked at a map and realized that that was the shortest route for us!  And since a bunch of family would be there, too, we tried to figure out (like, the day before we left) if we could meet up with any of them!

So we left first thing Tuesday morning, made way better time that I thought we would, and got to St. Louis a little before 5pm!  We checked into our hotel and then met up with my mom at St. Louis' finest dining, a really crappy Taco Bell on the wrong side of the tracks! 😂 (Natalie and her family went to a Cardinals game and had invited us to join them, but I was worried about the expense and getting there on time; I also wasn't sure we'd want to spend hours sitting in uncomfortable seats after driving all day, so we finally decided not to do it.)  We enjoyed our Taco Bell and then headed to Ted Drewes' and found Tracy and Adam there, visiting with Adam's niece and nephew (and their spouses) who live in St. Louis.  So that was fun (and delicious)!

I took a picture of the graffiti because Bentley loves stuff like that.  Somehow I did not take any pictures of me or my family...

The next morning we headed to the arch!  We wandered through the museum while Craig looked for parking (I HATE trying to park in a city!!!) and watched the film about the making of the arch.  It was absolutely WILD watching all the workers climbing all over the arch without any ropes or harnesses or anything.  That's what architecture looked like before OSHA, I guess.  They bragged in the film about how they were insured for up to 13 deaths, but didn't actually lose anyone.  That's really great, but seriously???  What a different world...

Cora and Camille enjoy a dugout canoe in the museum

Kendra with a little statue of a handcart pioneer!!!  (With Tracy and Adam in the background!)

Then we got to go up to the top of the arch!  The ride up was slightly claustrophobic.  I was glad for the windows in our little car (which Craig told me were a somewhat recent addition), otherwise I think I might have struggled.

That's one cozy little pod (even more so once Craig was sitting in there with us)

View from the top!  The people down there are just specks!

Back on the ground, we quickly snapped pictures of us with the arch and then Craig hurried to move the van before we could get a ticket.  

Then it was back to Ted Drewes for one more round of frozen custard before we drove to Branson!

It was there that we finally ran into Natalie and her family, so that was a perfect surprise!  After we'd finished our custard, but while we were still wandering into a nearby chocolate shop and purchasing butter cakes at a third shop (where three of my children bought giant squishy (fake) sticks of butter for themselves) we also ran into my Aunt Lorraine and Uncle Bob!  The family reunion was well and truly underway!  We scrambled the cousins all around-- so Tracy and Adam got Kendra, Natalie & Cameron took Ryder and Colton, and we had Camille, Nicole, Claire, and Cora in our car-- and I stole my Mom and made her ride with us, too.  And then everyone was on their way to Branson!

We stopped at a Buc-ee's along the way-- partly because we needed gas and it was super cheap to fill up, but also because I wanted my Mom to experience the joy that is Buc-ee's!  (She was astounded at the price of gas-- about half what they're charging in Seattle!)  And we ran into Bob and Lorraine there, too!!!  So fun!

Rolling up to our rental house, we discovered two things: the entire neighborhood was terrifyingly perched on some steep hills overlooking nearby Table Rock Lake.  Just driving up and down those hills made me catch my breath.  And they were clearly rebuilding some of the retaining walls in ways that did NOT inspire confidence.  If I see on the news some day that the entire development has come crashing down, I will not be surprised.  But if you could just ignore that, the house itself was PERFECT.  Every bedroom had an ensuite bathroom, plus an extra half bath on every floor.  You entered on the main floor, which had a huge deck, huge living room, huge kitchen (two fridges and two dishwashers) and HUGE table, with three bedrooms, then on the next level down were more bedrooms and a poker table, and on the third and lowest floor, there were more bedrooms and game rooms and stuff.  It meant that the kids spent most of the time playing on the lower floors while the grown ups could hang out on the top floor chatting away with very little noise or distractions from their kids!  Amazing!!!

There you can see the lake, with a tiny moon above it all!

More to come!

Assateague Again!

It had been years since we went to Assateague and/or Chincoteague-- I think we stopped shortly after we moved to Charlottesville and realized it was just a lot farther away now, we hadn't bothered.  But Camille had seen the pictures from those camping trips and desperately wanted to see the horses.  She was really just a baby last we went, so I guess we can't fault her for not remembering.  So we told her we could go again.

It was fun taking the truck camping, instead of the van for once!  Weird advantages to only having two kids, who knew?

We left on Monday afternoon, so we had our weekly chat with Bentley while we were on the road.  We took this picture to show him how much we were missing him:

The drive went really smoothly, but we'd gotten a later start than we wanted and had to stop a few times, so it was nearly dark by the time we arrived.  But we did catch this sunset as we were searching for our campsite and Camille was literally squealing with joy seeing all the ponies right away!  (I think she was worried that we would have bad luck and just not see any horses.  Nope, they're everywhere!!!)

Then we spotted this colt and the squealing went up an octave!

So that was a perfect introduction to the island!  Then we found our campsite and discovered that it was NOT the same place that I was picturing!  Apparently in the past we'd camped in the state park, which has really great bathrooms.  But this time we were in the national park, which has drop toilets and a couple outdoor, cold-water-only showers!  Not quite what I had in mind!!!

So that was a bummer.  It was also crazy windy, which meant I was struggling with the kids to set up our tents while Craig was struggling to build a fire.  We were kind of a mess.  Plus, we had to carry everything from our car, which was parked a little ways away.  One of those distances that doesn't seem far until you're carrying everything and walking in the sand.  And then it's a HUGE pain.

By the time we'd got everything set up and cooked our dinner, it was so late.  And chilly!!!  We were not expecting to be cold in June!  But we huddled around our picnic table enjoying our foil dinners and the gourmet grilled cheese sandwiches we'd made (at least, the ones that didn't get burned).  And then!  Suddenly a bunch of horses marched through our campsite and began gathering around us, eyeing our dinners!!!  Now-- these are ponies.  They aren't very big.  But they're still way bigger than us!  And you're not supposed to touch them, since they might kick or bite you.  So how do you protect your food???  We were clapping our hands and making noises trying to shoo the horses away, but you really just feel so stupid, knowing the other campers nearby are watching you to see what's going to happen!

As it turned out, we managed to successfully drive the horses away without them touching our dinners!  Huzzah!  But it made me nervous!

With the last of our coals, we managed to make s'mores.  Then we blew up our air mattresses (no small feat, carrying them through the wind from the truck, where our pump was, back to the tents!) and settled in to sleep.  It was still very chilly.  I pulled my hoodie over my head and hoped for even a little bit of sleep, and laughed at Craig all bundled up in his sleeping bag:

This is beach camping?  In June???

But actually, I slept pretty well!  I woke up a few times in the night to roll over, but then went right back to sleep.  It was amazing.  Maybe I should always sleep with a hoodie on?

As soon as he was awake in the morning, Craig made pancakes and sausages for everyone and then we headed over the dune to the beach! 

You could lock your cooler under the table to keep it safe from the horses

Camille and Colton pretty much played all day.  

Building sand castle condominiums

Impressive, no?

I'm not sure if this kite is supposed to be a squid or a jellyfish?  Or something else entirely...?

I spent most of the day wrapped in my towel watching them and watching all the crabs scuttling around me.  That sounds awful, but those crabs were terribly fascinating, once you started paying attention to them!  They'd pop out of those holes and hurl a bit of sand away.  Sometimes they'd come at each other, and a couple times I watched smaller crabs get dragged down into the bigger crab's holes!!!  Yikes!

Kite flying was very popular!

Eventually I was done, so I headed off to take a shower.  It was so cold.  Rinsing my hair actually gave me brain freeze-- I didn't know that was possible!!!!  But as is usually the case, it was worth it to feel clean again!  And even though I'd been kind of cold all day, getting out of the cold shower made me feel warm.  I wandered back to my tent and took a really great nap, waking up right as Craig and the kids came back.  They showered off, too, and then we drove into town for a very early dinner at some Tex Mex place.  Yum.

Colton was so sunburned.  I don't know why we can't ever manage to properly protect our kids from those UV-rays!  We try so hard!

We bought more wood so we could have another campfire and s'mores!  This time when the horses wandered through the campsites, we weren't concerned because we didn't have any food for them to grab.  But the joke was on us, because we'd forgotten about our bag of garbage and the horses snatched it, ripped it open, and dug into that bag so fast!  It was a mess, and we had no way to get the garbage away from them!  Silly horses.  I guess they got a taste of those foil dinners after all...

Garbage or no, Camille was thrilled!

Colt!

Everyone loves foil dinners, I guess...

Happy Camille!

Then the horses started, well, horsing around!  The colt was trying to jump at the other horses and they were clearly annoyed with him, and I was having visions of horses crashing into our tents and breaking everything, it was kind of stressful!  But eventually they moved on and nothing bad happened.  Phew!

Look at the big horse's eyes there!  He is NOT happy about this game!

After that we headed to bed.  Poor Colton was miserable and we were exhausted.  The wind had been blowing the entire time we'd been there, and everything inside our tent was covered in a fine layer of sand.  Gross.  But thanks to my hoodie, I slept pretty well again, even with the tent flapping and snapping in the wind!

As soon as the sun was up we threw everything into the truck and headed out.  That was enough camping for us!  We stopped at a bakery for doughnuts and then just drove and drove and drove.  There's a bridge that we crossed over the Chesapeake and the van ahead of us hit a seagull and it spun out like a helicopter going haywire-- that was wild.  That same bridge goes underground a couple times, and then second time, there was a huge cargo ship that crossed over us right as we were underground and somehow that just seemed crazy, too.

And as is always the case, it was awfully nice sleeping in my own bed again!

Hopefully that was enough horses for Camille for a bit...!

They tried to recreate Ryder's goofy shots from 2014!  😂