To the beach!

We are home again from another short but fun family trip, this time to the coast with all of Russ's family - a whoppin' 21 of us! Words can't describe the meaningfulness of this annual trip to me... priceless memories.

And now, a rundown of how we entertain ourselves:
(containing so many pictures I decided to not clog up my home page this time... follow the jump!)


1. Playing down by the lake. For the kids, this takes up roughly 80% of the day, from dawn till dark. (Literally, two nights in a row we couldn't find a couple of the kids and sure enough they were still digging in the sand at 9 pm.)

2. Fishing. Lots of fishing.

 

3. Canoeing and kayaking (and canoe vs. kayak wars).

4. Swimming. Sometimes at 8 pm.

5. Watching movies.

6. Playing board games (Qwelf was a hit with the kids while we broke out Settlers, Qwirkle, and Can You Name 5).

^^Great Grandma learns how to play qwirkle^^

7. Doing 1000 piece puzzles.

8. Playing pool (and ping pong in the basement)

^^It is impossible to get every boy in the room to pose normally. Nice one, Cooper.^^ 

9. Going to the beach 5 minutes away. (Rain or shine, or in our case: mist.)

^^Russ & I, Tricia & Erik, Cara & Tim^^

10. Climbing this monster.

11. Attempting cousins pictures that quickly turn to wrestling matches.

^^Blake, Sam, Cooper, Derek, Ben, Drew, & Mark in the back and Lizzy, Maddy, Debbie, Kendall, & Mandy in the front^^

12. And finally, let us not forget the iconic family group shot; which this year included a glow-in-the-dark father-in-law thanks to my poor choice to leave the camera flash on. Wowsa, Gary.

Fun times. (And this list didn't even include the afternoon we went shopping at the outlets in Lincoln City!)

Thanks to my amazing in-laws this trip happens every year, no matter what. I think we're on year 7 or 8 now. Here's to the next 8 years!!!