Easter Dinner with lots of Family

Easter around my parents house was extra exciting this year. My dad's brother Alan and his sister, Susan and my Uncle John joined us for dinner. My cousin Kristine and her family also came. We don't see these guys very often, especially Aunt Susan and Uncle John, so it was wonderful to visit with them again.
We looked through books about our family tree and discussed the upcoming wedding of our cousin Kate who will be joining the Royal family next week. And we wondered where our invitations to the wedding were. Then we thought perhaps Buckingham Palace would be a nice spot for our next family reunion.
Shortly after college, Aunt Susan and Uncle John let me and my friend Sheryl crash at their amazing home on Nantucket Island for a whole amazing summer. We had so much fun there and it was really cool getting to spend that time with my Aunt and Uncle. I can't believe it's been 12 years since then.


Robyn recently got engaged! Congratulations you two, and welcome to our crazy family, Jeff. We're glad to have you.

Vincent and Daniel had a blast playing with their second cousins. Vincent is seen here sliding under Mari and Stella with his bag of treats from Great Aunt Susan. What fun!

I put their collared shirts on, they chose to wear ties. So handsome.

Tunnel View

Before leaving Yosemite, we drove up to see one of my favorite views in the world. From here, you can see Half Dome, El Capitan, Bridalveil Falls; all part of this amazing place. You can't see cars, roads or buildings beneath the vast Redwoods and Pines, so it looks like the Valley has remained untouched by civilization. We visited Yosemite almost every year when I was growing up. I just love coming back to visit.


We pulled over for dinner at Don Pedro Lake. Gavin woke up and ran around for a while, but Vincent and Daniel were in a deep sleep at 7pm, not to be disturbed. So we watched the sunset and kept driving.

Yosemite Waterfalls

We visited Yosemite for the weekend. It was amazingly beautiful. With all the snow this year, water was falling from high above, everywhere we looked. Streams flowed through the valley floor looking as if the whole place was about to flood . We are blessed to live so close to such beauty.
We camped at Upper Pines campground with Megan, Brian and Dominic. After the U.S. Government threatened to shutdown last week, it looked like Yosemite would be closed the second time in a month, both times we had reservations to go. At the last minute, they figured it out and kept the national parks open so we could enjoy a fun weekend amongst the Redwoods and bears.
The photo above is of the four cousins hiking back from Yosemite Falls. The two-year-olds were fantastic hikers. The same cannot be said for the older boys.

Vincent at Yosemite Falls

As we pulled into our campsite on Saturday, it started snowing. The ground was already blanketed with snow and we were prepared for a winter weekend. The boys were all excited about the white stuff falling from the sky. But it only lasted a minute. The weekend grew gradually warmer and by the time we left, very little snow was left of the ground. There was lots of sledding off the 5' hill of snow in our campsite.

Half Dome

Daniel and Vincent both begged from rides every time we walked somewhere. Someday I hope to go on back-packing adventures as a family, hiking the John Muir Trail and such. We're not off to a very good start. Any tips for getting my boys to walk better, farther, faster? I always hated walking myself as a kid, so maybe they got it from me.

Dom and Gav are so much fun to watch together. They were in their own little world playing together and fighting over this motorcycle. If you look closely, you can see a hole punctured through the front of Dominic's motorcycle. During the night, a bear visited our camp, put some holes in the bike and brought it to another camp site.

Cutting & Pasting

Daniel and Vincent stayed home sick from preschool the other day. So Vincent's teacher, Miss Jordan, brought over projects for them to work on. Daniel cuts with such concentration.
Upon waking from his nap, Vincent played with the boards above his bed...the ones that hold up the bunk above his. He moved them around with his feet until one knocked loosed and hit him on the cheek. Subsequently, he got a really nice shiner. This photo was taken before his whole eye turned black.
Gavin participated in the cutting and pasting mainly by biting the lid off of the paste.

The Devil's Golf Course and Natural Bridge

The view from the Natural Bridge trail head overlooked the Badlands which is the lowest place in North America at 289 feet below sea level. It was a vast, hot salt flat juxtaposed by snow capped mountains.



We took a one mile hike up to "Natural Bridge". The walk through the deep canyon was just as cool as the bridge and the kids found lots of caves to climb into.

Gavin just loves his Daddy.

We also visited a place called the Devil's Golf Course. As we drove out into the salt flat on a bumpy dirt road, we wondered what we were heading for. At last we saw these crystallized formations of salt stretching it seemed for miles, a jagged wasteland. As our boys love salt, they feasted it.
After a little of this tricky hiking, Vincent took a spill and scratched his legs up pretty good. Instant salt in the wounds. Poor guy.

Daniel and Alanna weren't thirsty at all after this (:

Here is our crew of tired, dirty, scratched up kids. They had fun and had the bumps and bruises to prove it. Daniel fell out of a tree, Vincent got scratched by the salt flats and on our last day, Gavin fell off the picnic table which landed us at his first dentist appointment once we got home. X-rays showed no damage to the tooth we though he knocked forward. There was plenty of blood though.