Our Family Ramblings!

Jack has two older brothers, JP and Jeff. Jeff lives in State College with his wife Jen and two little girls. (Maddie and Hannah!) JP lives with his wife Tammy and son Gardner in Raleigh, NC! We all gathered for the 4th! It isn't very often that we get together, but when we do-- we try to get everything crammed into our visit! This visit was a family photo! The last family photo was taken when Haylee was 14 mo. old. So now 6 years and 4 grandchildren later, we attempt a family photo. God bless the poor gals who took the photo! With so many differing personalities and 6 children, it was no small feat! I thought on my end it would be piece of cake! My kids are older and pretty much can do what they are told, and Savannah is miss personality and smiles all the time! Boy was I wrong on the Savannah front!! The gals positioned us all in the proper places and then counted down with the last # being very high pitched and loud. Savannah let out the loudest most pathetic ear piercing scream and continued to scream until Jack calmed her down. For every picture after that, she would calm down and then the flash would go off and she would scream again. I think the gals must have taken frame after frame , because wonder of wonders, we got a picture that actually came out good. Everyone looked good, looked at the camera, and was smiling! It must have been the first frame she shot because Savannah's sweet face isn't red or wet yet! ( Thanks Jess for the bow for Savannah! It made her outfit!!)

The Gooches

One of my childhood memories was running around at night in my back yard catching lightning bugs! I had a full circle moment when my kids went outside and caught lighting bugs! It is really cool watching their faces and thinking about my experiences doing that same exact thing! They had so much fun! The idea was to see how many they could catch and put in a jar. They got pretty good at it! I think Nathaniel had 8 or 9 and Haylee had about the same before they had to come inside to avoid getting bit by the mosquitos!

Maddie and Haylee!

We also had some relatives from MD come up to visit as well! Thanks guys for making that trip! It was great to see you all!! Since we can't be together on everyones's birthdays, Jen ordered a birthday cake and had all the kids names on it. We sang Happy Birthday to all the kids! We are good for the year!!

Next... "Amusing" Fun!!