Cousins

We're back home in Abbotsford now. After some long days of driving, we finally pulled into our garage just before 3 am on Sunday morning. Now we're trying to get back into routine and going through vacation "de-tox"! We already had one adventure yesterday which landed Keziah in the ER for about 5 hours. She had a really bad fall on her head while her and Micah were playing in the house and actually passed out for a few seconds. Erik took her into emergency where they monitored her for the rest of the afternoon. She turned out to be fine, but it sure scared us!! Hopefully today can be a bit more of a normal day.

Anyway, there are still so many pictures to share from our trip, so I decided to devote this post to the cousins. My parents now have 12 grandkids in total and 11 of them were together on the Father's Day weekend. It was a crazy house!! The other kids are all quite used to these chaotic get-togethers, but Micah and Keziah seemed a little bewildered by all the activity. Several times I found Micah off playing on his own. It bothered me a bit at first - I wanted him to make the most of his time with all of his cousins - but I had to remember that he doesn't really know these kids. Plus, if he's anything like me, he probably needs to retreat from the crowd when it gets too overwhelming.

I was surprised at how much my nieces and nephews have grown up. The last time I saw them all was over a year ago. Erik hadn't seen them in over 2 years.

Maddy (9) is the oldest:


Kailyn (also 9) is next. These older girls loved holding baby Silas :)


Josh & Aidan are both 7:


Olivia will be 7 in a few weeks:


Cassidy is 5:


Micah comes next and then Liam, who just turned 4:


Noah (3) is the next cousin and the only one we weren't able to see. Keziah is number 10, and then the 11th cousin is Judah (20 months):


(And, Silas, of course makes 12! )

It was so great to re-connect with all of these kids and get to know them a little bit better.


Keziah taught everyone how to drink from the slip-n-slide:


Smush-mallow roasting:


Aidan & Josh getting creative with Granny's craft supplies:


Micah, Josh and Aidan at the train museum in Boissevain:


Uncle Erik playing some baseball with the boys on the lawn:


Cassidy getting in some Silas time:


On Father's Day the older cousins had planned out a carnival complete with a fishing game, ball toss and even babysitting :) Very creative! They spent all day Saturday planning it out and creating little games and prizes. The 5 of us missed most of the carnival since we were busy getting family pictures taken by my sister before the church service (which was a bit of an adventure in itself!) Later in the day the kids had a "balloon release", except the balloons didn't really fly away like we all thought they would, so it turned into more of a balloon popping party...


And here are 11 of the 12 kids with Granny & Grandpa on Father's Day:


I already miss all the kids and I'm so glad that Micah and Keziah are starting to put faces to all of those names!