road trip.

summer, in my opinion, is all about vacation. you go on trips, swim by the pool, relax a little more, spend more time outside, stay up later than normal, and eat a lot of popsicles, ice cream, and watermelon. since it took forever for summer to come to portland, it was nice to get away to southern califnornia for some nice family vacay.

we were heading down primarily for an extended family reunion with all my cousins, aunts, uncles and grandparents on my mom's side and then decided to stay a few extra days to do disneyland and sea world!

the reunion was in good, old hemet where i went for family vacations a lot when i was younger. i have a lot of fun memories with cousins down there so it was fun to introduce travis and the boys to that town. it was really fun catching up with everyone. i am so lucky to have really great extended family who make me want to be better every time i'm with them.

and now for the pics. wow, i took A LOT of pictures. if you weren't at the reunion, i think you're definitely going to feel like you were after all of these!

we stayed with my cousin chad and his family while were there with a few of my other cousins and their kids. on the first night there calvin was in heaven because there were so many kids to play with the whole time! i don't think he ate while we were there unless we forced him to because he was so happy just playing. here are calvin and audrey (chad and sarah's daughter) running their obstacle course set up by travis.

audrey wanted in on the action and started coming up with her own obstacle course.

my family members who were able to be there with my grandma and grandpa. this wasn't even half of my siblings who could make it! we missed everyone who couldn't come.

sisters!

anytime we went to visit grandma and grandpa in hemet we were always invited into their storage closet to pick out some candy. on this trip all of the little kids were given a bag to fill up with as much candy as it could hold. ok, and we adults got in on the fun, too!

calvin and his cousins enjoying the spoils.

sunday night we took family pictures. here are all the kiddos wishing we would just let them swim!

this next series i like to call the jackson and calvin show. (and an occasional little brother or cousin) jackson is my cousin michelle's little boy. they are about 4 months apart and loved playing the entire weekend. it's too bad we don't live closer!

that's a lot of tibbitts women!

grandma!

sweet megan. eric and katie's youngest daughter. so cute.

on our pool day i was pretty happy.

my mom's uncle myrl with all the great-grandkids. he had a tradition of always letting us put our hands in a jar of coins and pull out as much as we could hold and we got to keep it. it's a great memory of mine as a little girl. he was so generous and let the new generation of kids do the same thing.

at the beach.

this is the "i'm done now" picture.

and this is him walking straight for me. lovely.

calvin is such a snuggler. especially with my mom. he loves his grandma.

and grandpa, too!

my sisters and sister-in-law who were there.

whew. never thought i'd finish this! thank you to everyone who made this reunion possible! we made a lot of fun memories and i'm so lucky to be apart of such a great family. until next time!

oh, disneyland/sea world pics still to come...