I didn't want to miss anything while I was home...especially my siblings! There are 10 of us and it is too rare that we are ALL in one place at the same time. At Christmas last year we almost had everyone, but we could all tell that part of our family was missing. We still had fun and enjoyed our time at the cabin, but it would have been so perfect to have the entire gang there. We were missing Tracie and her crew and we could all tell!
Katelyn wasn't a fan of the throwing big kid stuff and she has been all about strollers lately. If she can push one around and not be the one that has to ride in it she is a happy camper. She loves swimming, but strollers and any "baby stuff" is a dream come true for her.
They each took turns to search for their treasure following the map and finding the hidden pieces of the map along the way.
Then they got to dig up their treasure!
Some parts were very dangerous! Swords in the mouth and all!
My dad built a monkey bridge that streatched across the trees in the backyard...so cool! If I wasn't pregnant I would have tried it out.
My dad even put some obstacles in the ground like this piece of "drift wood" that made them think they found a treasure, but it just told them that they were "close" and needed to keep digging!
Papa was one scary pirate!
He was just a good actor :)
Part of the fun was trying to beat McKay in the games. He is the UNO king and seriously is tough to beat at that game. Battleship and Chutes & Ladders were some favorites of his too.
Here we all are with our spouses and individual family's from oldest to youngest...
Tracie and Ryan:
Chad and his wife Amber:
Brooks and John:
Chris and his wife Tricia:
Liam wasn't too thrilled with the pictures and let us all know :)
Ben and Elizabeth:
Nick and Christine:
David and I:
Matt and his last day with his fiance Chelsea who is now his wife:
And the last two unmarried kids, Abby and Luke:
This photo is awkward but funny because it is a remake of a picture when Abby was about 4 and Luke was 3 and it looked about the same. Luke hasn't really ever been on the small side and with his football player build it looks way too similar as it did 15 years ago. Abby do you have that picture?
And the best for last! Here's the amazing parents who are recently empty-nesters and couldn't be more thrilled...or maybe bored...to have us all grown up!
Oh these puppies were so perfect! And maybe a little racist with the dark one with Katelyn, but they are still so cute! These kids couldn't get enough of the puppies while we were all home.
Here's all of the grandkids...10 here and three on the way!
And the whole crew!
Showing a little love here...
Here are all the original Bare kids and my parents:
And we have a hard time being normal and presentable all the time...
It was so fun having EVERYBODY home. I loved spending some much needed time with each of my siblings and especially our "long lost sister" who lives way too far away ;) We all are jealous of her travels and that they get to see so much of Europe, but we all want to see more of her and her family so we tease her every chance we get so we get to see her in real life sometimes too...Maybe we could all move to Germany?
When Matt announced he was getting married, Tracie announced that her family was going to be there too! (They live in Germany, so it isn't cheap or simple to get stateside) I knew that I wanted to be there when she was there and she was going for a whole month! I got really excited and started planning decided to fly home before the wedding so that our trips overlapped by three weeks and I am so glad I did!
I love these pictures despite the early morning look...just us moms doing our thing!
It was so nice to be home with her and see her in her element as a mom. My other sister, Brooks, came for a quick visit one weekend and we had plenty of nights up way too late chatting about things that put the boys to sleep. Tracie and I went out shopping for wedding clothes and clothes for our family pictures as well. I pushed her to try out different outfits that she wasn't so sure about and I think sometimes she was pleasantly surprised. It was great to browse the mall and stores with no kids in tow!
Her four kids are growing up so much and it was fun to see their quirks and personalities. Katelyn loved baby Jake and would go check on him while he was napping...sometimes waking him up, but then they would entertain each other and jabber at each other...and she loved any chance she would get to feed him his bottle because he would snuggle up and let her hold him. We had to be careful because Jake would eat any food he could get his hands on and Katelyn sometimes wanted to share her food and sometimes it was too big or too dangerous for him (mostly chips) but we all survived!
Katelyn and Morgan had a love/hate relationship and sometimes they couldn't stand each other and knew exactly how to push each other's buttons. Other times they were singing their hearts out and playing with babies and acting like puppies. It was always a toss up with those two! We had plenty of time at the pool with my cousin's kids and Sammy was the sweetest to Katelyn anytime she was around. These girls had lots of fun playing and running around together.
McKay and Easton are both quite a bit older than Katelyn but they were good with her. They jumped on the trampoline and taught her how to bounce so big and looked out for her when they were playing on some toys with lots of other big kids we didn't know. The boys liked to do their own thing most of the time, but didn't mind Katelyn running along most of the time either. The boys had a blast at the pool with their strong uncles that could throw them around...this boring pregnant aunt of their's wasn't nearly as much fun :)
The baby pool whirl pools are classic and I am sure that I have been in hundreds of these since I was Katelyn's age.
It was busy and we were making plans for when the entire crew would be coming for the wedding weekend, but I am so glad that I was able to be home while she was there. Skype calls just aren't enough and it was nice to spend some time with her and her family. Playing mom with her was fun and we were able to laugh at the "glamorous" side of motherhood together.
I wish we could spend the whole month at home with all the siblings and have a month long party! It isn't ever enough to just see each other for a short time and then have to go home. It was so awesome and a miracle that we were all able to be home for the wedding weekend. There's about 30 of us now and a lot of us are young in our careers and don't get much time off when we want or don't have money to casually pass around. I am so glad that everyone wanted to be there bad enough to make the arrangements needed to be there. I know my parents had plenty of times during the chaos of having us all home where they were just so happy and so grateful for what they started and wished we all didn't live so far away!
My dad won grandpa of the year as he planned out an awesome treasure hunt for his grandkids. He planned out an FHE lesson on what we should treasure in life which was really sweet and the kids were into it. They were discussing what a treasure is and the kids were talking about how money is like treasure and then McKay piped up and let everyone know the truth and said, "If you don't have any money, then you can't buy anything...unless you have a credit card!" We all got a good laugh out of him and his smarty pants!
The next morning my dad woke us all up bright and early with his pirate talk and the kids were ready for the adventure that they had been anticipating for a couple weeks.
My dad did a second round of the treasure hunt for Chad's kids and it was good too. These kids are some fierce pirates out for their treasure!
Katelyn was too little to understand the whole thing, but she had her sword tied around her waist and was ready to follow along to watch the action.
Each treasure hunter had a big little helper just in case they needed it. David helped fearless Emme find her treasure. I think David needs an eye patch or something!
Since we were ALL there, we had a long time family friend take some much needed family pictures.
Tracie and Ryan:
Chad and his wife Amber:
Brooks and John:
Chris and his wife Tricia:
These puppies loved the attention, but sometimes I think they feared their lives were in danger and quickly learned about sleeping and hiding under the deck when they wanted their peace and quiet...that is if they were fast enough to get under there before the kids snatched them up!
The happy grandparents:
