Labor Day

We spent a wonderful holiday weekend with the Webb family (my mom's family) at my aunt and uncle's brand-spankin' new ranch house near Italy, TX. We had an absolute blast. The best part was that by some planning miracle, everybody was able to be there. My mom has a brother and a sister and each of the three siblings has three kids making nine cousins in my generation. Six of us are married but Jeff and I are the only one with kids (read: our kids had A LOT of adult attention).

Whew! Is your head spinning yet?

I won't make you do the math---that's a total of 22 people and we all happily gathered at the Webb's ranch house for the weekend.

All of us get along extremely well and have a fantastic time when we can get together. Hopefully that will happen more than once a year now that the Campbell's home base is back in Texas. That'll bring Dan and Debby in from CA, and Steve "home" for visits from MI. Now THAT is something to be thankful for...and it's not even Thanksgiving!

Now for the good stuff...what in the world did we do together for 3 days?

We played A LOT of games...Catch Phrase, Dominos, 31 (Tim taught us this fun new one), and our traditional Spades Tourney. I was too busy playing (not doing a lot of winning though) to take pics of the games, but here's a good one from one of my cousins:

For the first time this year, Wiffle Ball joined the list of games we love to play. It started as a mostly cousins home run derby before extending into an entire family showdown. Everybody played...even little Jackson and Addi were out there getting in our way. Hopefully this will become a family tradition...and hopefully my team will win next time.

We lost even though we had a home-run-derby winner on our team. Check out feisty Remy up to bat (she's Brad's wife and Jackson's BFF).

There were also some grand adventures involving 4-wheeling and dirt biking around the 100+ acre ranch. The kids both loved riding the 4-wheelers. Here's Addi taking her first ride with cousin Brad.

And Jackson having to drive b/c Jeff's waving to the pretty lady with the camera.

All that excitement made Jackson have to potty and he was too muddy to take in. You can see him gloating to his sister about how easy it is for boys to pee outside.

We didn't keep the wildness outside though. Most afternoons were spent lounging on one of the porches or gathered in the living room watching the kids wrestle whoever they could talk into participating. Remy was always a willing victim and turned out to be Jackson's favorite playmate of the weekend. He couldn't help but to laugh and smile when she was around. Here they are sharing a moment.

As much as the kids enjoyed my cousins (their 2nd cousins), they still run to their daddy for their biggest thrills. He could throw them really high here without worrying about ceiling fans (cough, cough).


And if Uncles aren't for teaching kids naughty things, what are they for? Thanks, Tim, for teaching Addi to drop a "People's Elbow" on folks. Our friends love you already.

The ranch house is complete but the pond out back is still a work in progress. It was great because we got to take a field trip (literally) out to play on the heavy machinery.

Even Jeff liked the excavator...

Monday morning, the kids "helped" Uncle Brian (my mom's younger brother) fix a big rut in the grass where someone drove off the driveway.

But they didn't help for long. Eventually, Addi started decorating the driveway with muddy hand prints and Jackson quickly followed suit.

Whew! I'll bet your head is spinning now! That's a lot of fun crammed into one weekend and I haven't even covered the best excursion of our time there. It was so fun and unique that I'll have to give it an entirely separate post.

I will say to my Webb family that the kids are really missing everyone. Jackson keeps saying "Wet's do back to da Ranch and da Webb's to see our tuzzins." (Let's go back to the Ranch and the Webb's to see our cousins.) And then Addi chimes in with "Yea, I miss our cousins. It was fun at Aunt Margaret's ranch house."

And I agree with them. Love you guys!!! Thanks to Dan, Debby, and Steve for flying in. Thanks, Kyle and Melissa, for spending your first weekend together with us. And thanks to the Webb's for hosting another great reunion. We miss you guys already.