last of the 2012 pictures {family time}

And just a little bit more from 2012... 

 

Our kids counted down all month for the day that their Michigan cousins would be here. Just about every waking hour they were here, we spent time at Nana and Papa's with them.

It took Gavin a few days to warm up to them. He definitely didn't just let them hold him and carry him around like he did last year and this summer.  But he got there slowly.

Had we had another week with them, they would have gotten to be best buds again like they were before.

 

 He found Jeremy's shoes and was trying to put them on himself.  When Jeremy sat down to help him, he was mesmorized by the big shoes that were on his feet.

 

 

There have been many hours of Legos.  Thanks Aunt Rebekah for the awesome race car set!

 And we spent an afternoon bowling.

(ha, ignore the fact that my settings were all over the place)

 

Mason was beating all the kids until the end.  I think he was throwing it harder than anyone.  He ran and threw with all his might, every time.

 

I about deleted this next one, because he's obviously out of focus.  But then I realized that it was when he got a strike, and it just made me smile, remembering how excited he was.

 

Poor Gavin wasn't feeling well at all.  So he just chilled most of the time of Papa's lap.

And this little neice of ours was quite entertaining to watch.  She had a different position, dance or jump that she ended every single throw with.

 

The kids had 3 slumber party nights in a row.  I think that may be a lot for any kid, but for sure a lot for a 4 and 6 year old.  And attitudes and behaviors were definitely hurting because of it.  But the cousin time and memories made are worth it.

 

We celebrated 2 Christmases, New Years Eve, and a birthday party, all in the few days that we got with our Michigan crew.

It sure has made this first week of January feel awful lonely and boring.

 

vacation 2012 {the 4th}

It's always so fun to celebrate the 4th on the lake.

We ended the night camped out in chairs watching a handful of private fireworks shows around us.

With a baby sleeping soundly, upstairs, in the closet, with his white noise.

vacation 2012 {on the water}

I'm finally catching up on vacation pictures, about one month later.

Every other year our summer vacation is spent in Michigan, with all of Dave's family.

We made the 18 hour drive straight through, only stopping for throw up, and feeding children.

We've taken our kids on lots of long trips in the car.  Last year we drove 18 hours to Destin, Fl.  And never before have either of them gotten car sick.  But for some reason, this trip, we found out they both get car sick.  3 stops, and a round of Dramamine later (all in our first 3 hours), we were smooth sailing the rest of the trip.

And sweet Gavin, he was next to perfect.  Silent for 99.9% of the drive.  I think he's going to be an overachiever.

We made it to the lake, got settled in to the third floor room.

Gavin's little crib fit perfectly into the big walk-in closet.  So with the door shut and his white noise on, he slept like a charm the whole week.

Our vacation consisted of mostly living in a swim suit for 6 days, no makeup, no blow-dryers or straightners on my part.  It's definitely my kind of vacation.

We logged a whole lot of hours on this lake.

Kayaking

Jet Skiing

Lots of tubing

 Dave got to try out the helmet cam.

This little guy got quite brave on the tube.

First it was no hands.

And then on his knees.

And Taylor graduated from the tube that's virtually impossible to fall off of (the big red one in the pictures) to this tube, all by herself.

We had one day of rain and then a few other showers/storms at times that came and went.

 

And this sweet boy had a grand ole time just sitting and watching everyone.

I'm so glad he wasn't crawling yet this week (he decided to start the day after we left the lake), because it would have been a lot harder to keep him confined and happy if so.

(maybe someday you won't have yucky gunky red eyes all the time - it's either tear duct issues or allergies, it's still not certain)

We decided it was time to try Taylor on skis.

 I didn't get any pictures once we started moving because I was too nervous to have something at my face.  She didn't get all the way up, but definitely got a good start.  It's the one thing we wished we could have spent more time doing.  But when you have 7 kids all wanting to do different things, it's hard to spend too much time teaching one of them for too long.

And of course the skiing stud got up for just a bit too.  I beg and beg him to ski because it's so fun to watch him.  He usually says no and complains he's too old, and that it's not that fun, and it's too much work.

But he did it for me.

Stay tuned for more of our vacation.