A wedding....a gigantic family...and a whole lot of cookies!

August 15, 2013

A wedding....a gigantic family...and a whole lot of cookies!

We just got back from our annual summer trip to San Diego. We started the week with our dear friends the Bronsons and the Winters-Macnamaras. We had a nice dinner out. I was also lucky enough to fit in 2 more dates with Tracy and Stacey throughout the week. We snuck away for a fancy (super yummy) dinner out and got together again for a nice hike around Lake Hodges. I am so thankful for my friends and their wonderful

time with friends

the girls with Baxie, Sully, and quinn

families. This year, we had an additional even more exciting reason to head west...Zachary and Darlene got married. The wedding was really fun. They had a food truck, which was awesome and the location was gorgeous. The happy couple asked the girls and me to bake the cookies for the wedding. We were happy to do it and spent a good part of the week in cookie making mode. We made almost 600 cookies! Grandpa was super helpful and Matt pitched in by doing all the dishes, as we baked. The whole thing came together so well and the cookies looked and, more importantly, tasted great. (I may or may not have eaten my weight in cookies) Aunt Diane lent her usual creative flare to decorating the boxes to display the cookies and again, Grandpa pitched in to retrofit the boxes to be more functional. When we weren't making cookies, we were able to spend lots of time playing games with Uncle Brian and Grandma and Grandpa. On top of that, we spent time with all of our extended family. And just when we thought we could not cram one more thing in to the week...we squeezed in a beach day at Coronado. Uncle Mark, Aunt Diane, Sarah and Ryan joined us, even though they had just driven in from Tahoe the day before (we really appreciate that) And Aunt Michelle, Gavin Lu, and Miles drove up from Temecula to hang out at the beach with us as well. (Again, thanks for the extra effort) Unfortunately, all of my children ignored my sunscreen lectures and failed to reapply...nothing like a good sunburn to remind you of that for future reference. There was a rollicking good game of ultimate Frisbee though, which was fun to watch. The week was exhausting but so fun. The entire Kenney family made it out for the wedding so we were able to visit with EVERY member. Every one also came back after the wedding for pizza at Grandma and Grandpas. Uncle Greg, Aunt Amy, Gabe, Grace and Ella joined in the fun even though they had a long drive home the next day. (we were so excited to visit with their family...we live so far away and see them so infrequently) We all felt grateful for that time. Especially the girls...they normally feel so left out of the loop because we are the only family that does not attend the regular family vacation together in Door County. It was so nice for them to hang out with all of their cousins. Numerous games of football and kick the can were played and all the cousins had a great time together. We left on Sunday to make our own long drive home so that we could start school on Monday. :( Our time in San Diego was a great way to end our summer.