Family Reunion

To top off our busy month, we headed straight from the lake day to a family reunion. The kids played with cousins that they knew and ones they just met...
...did some good fishing off our Kozy Kabin deck...
...and received some shovels and buckets from PaPa and Grandma to get them ready for the first mystery stop on their upcoming road trip.

Gym Day at the Lake

Margaret's gymnastics team had a outing to Lake Tawakoni on Friday at a beautiful lake house on 100 acres. We brought the boat and Kyle spent hours towing girls around on the ski rocket. Then there were team building games, 4 wheeler rides, food, awards, and fireworks. We were all taken by surprise when Margaret was chosen by the coaches to recieve the Leadership award for her level team. We are so proud of her!

Leadership trophy view of the lake from the house
Nathan's favorite part - 4 wheeler rides
Obstacle course hula hoop challenge
Throw the girl through the goalposts

Little Camp on the Prairie

The day after we got back from our trip, Margaret went to Prairie Adventure Camp. This year, her friend Madilyn went with her - and they had a great time dressing up in period costume, knitting, making candles, making cornbread, and playing old-fashioned games.

Stop #3: H-Town

We left the beach and headed for Houston to visit our friends Brent and Tracy and kids Jessica, Ryan and baby Nicholas. We spent all day Sunday at the Kemah Boardwalk. Thrill-seeker Margaret rode the Boardwalk Bullet roller coaster twice. Nathan prefered a little tamer thrills on the airplane ride. On Monday, we made a stop by Rocket Park before heading home.

Kemah is Kool!

Saturn V Rocket - it's big!

All the kiddos

Stop #2: The Gulf Coast

We left Atlanta on Tuesday morning and headed for the coast. We got a great condo on the beach in Orange Beach, Alabama (alot like Destin, but less crowded). We only spent two nights there, but we squeezed in as beach activity as we could.

View from our balcony - there are dolphins in the water

Boogie boarding

Happy Father's Day at the Aquarium

On Father's Day, our whole crew went on an outing to the Georgia Aquarium in Downtown Atlanta. If you are ever in the Atlanta area, this is a must see.

Stop #1: Hot-lanta

We got up early on Friday morning to book it to Atlanta for a visit with our very good friends Rosylyn, Donnie, Matthew, Moya and new baby Malachi. It is hard to believe they moved away over 2 years ago. Margaret and Moya were so excited to be reunited and we all enjoyed rocking the new baby - only 3 weeks old. Isn't he cute?

2235

That is what our tripometer read when we rolled back into home this afternoon. Pictures and details from our 10 day trip around the Southeast to come...

IE mini-reunion

Back in college, Kyle and I both were Industrial Engineering majors. Our program was relatively small, so you got to know everyone in it pretty well. Two of my good buddies were Jana and Marianne.

After college, Mare and I ended up working together at TI in Houston and Jana moved back home to Nebraska. Then Marianne moved to Arizona for awhile, and then just a few years ago moved about 2 miles away from us. Last weekend was the first time that all 3 of us had been together since this picture was taken. This is my couch - from Jana's visit 8 years ago in Houston - with our first babies.
We thought it would be fun to try to re-create the picture. Same couch, different house, way more kids!

just first-borns
To continue down memory lane, here are Jana, Marianne, and me with our senior facilities design project. We were so proud of our work. Please ignore very bad fashion - this was 15 years ago!
And here we are today, presenting my mantle.

Surfin' into Summer

The last day of school was a great time. We had a surfing themed party for the kids in the morning, which included pictures for each kid. game stationsautographs
and a picnic lunch on beach towels