Island Park

Every year Jared's family spends memorial day in Island Park. I think they've been doing it for over 20 years. Jared's parents had a condo for that weekend every year. It is such a fun tradition in their family! We always have tons of fun every year.

This year we rented a cabin in addition to the condo. (The one pictured above is Jared's dad's cabin.) The family is so large now that a two bedroom condo just doesn't quite fit us all. :) We even got our own bed! It was nice to have a room for Ryan to take naps in.

We left Thursday night so we could be there on Friday for all the fun. We didn't want to get out our pack n' play so we had Ryan sleep with us that night at Grandpa's house. Oh my goodness! He is such a mover! I woke up once with Jared practically off the bed and Ryan laying all over him. lol. I don't know if we will do that much again. :)

We got up to Island Park on Friday afternoon. This was the beginning of lots and lots of food, treats, game playing, and laughing. We always have such a great time!

As soon as dinner was over, the games came out. Every year, everyone brings their laptops and Starcraft gets played. The little kids love it almost as much as a the big ones! You hear "Can I play on your computer yet?" a million times.

Starcraft Fanatics!

We played TONS of games! We played Turbo Scrabble (which I hate, but I play to be a good sport :) Boggle (also hate) we play these ones a lot! Jared's family is awesome at word games!, Canasta, Scattergories, GOLF, Fluxx, Yahtzee!, Phase 10, and lots of other ones I'm not remembering. :)

Jared loves Boggle so much, he made a computer program that finds all the words on the board. This cuts down on the arguing of what a word is. It was pretty awesome!


We also went swimming with Ryan. I was so excited to take him this year since he could play in the pool better. He was scared to DEATH! I have never had someone cling onto me as hard as he was. Poor baby! It took him a long time to start getting used to it. I tried to show him how to float for safety's sake and that scared him even more. The thing that got him really into it was jumping off the side. He didn't really jump, but he would slide off his bum into my arms. He loved that! and he thought it was hilarious to dump his face in the water. I wish I got pictures!

My sister and brother-in-law own a ribbon store so one of our crafts was ribbon flip flops. We had all the girls bring flip flops and they supplied the ribbon. It was such a fun craft! We all had a blast and every single one turned out freaking adorable! Lanae and I also made some ties for our boys. I didn't get a picture of mine yet, but I'll be writing a post on it over at The Ribbon Retreat blog.

It was a HUGE mess!

Ryan joined in on the fun! Thanks to cousin Sam for decorating him! :) He actually loved it and had a ball running around in that mess! lol

My flip flops. I used some fabric too, so I cut out the flower from the fabric and decorated with them. They are SO cute! We also painted our toenails. I love mine!

ALL the flip flops. So cute!

We went to the park they had there at the resort while it was somewhat nice out. And by somewhat nice, I mean not raining heavily or snowing. We had horrible weather the whole weekend. Ryan wanted to go outside so BAD! You could tell how happy he was getting fresh air and running around.

When Ryan saw these things, he kept saying "dog" and "arf!" So I thought he would love riding one. Turns out I was wrong! After we got him off the animal, he still kept looking at them and talking.

One of the nights, we were playing Golf (the card game). My nephew Cameron was sitting by me and whispering what moves I should make before I even had the thought to make one. It was 1 in the morning, I was tired and cranky, so this wasn't helping. lol. I told him he needed to go to bed. But if you know Cameron, this just makes him not want to go to bed more, and do whatever he is doing to bug you more. Poor Colten wanted to go to bed, but Cameron was being a stubborn stinker. So I threatened that their uncles were going to do something to them. Cameron's face basically said, "bring it on!" So Jared and Justin grabbed the boys (Cameron walked himself out) and stuffed snow down their pants (front and back). It was so funny! They still didn't go to bed, but it was so funny, I wasn't nearly as cranky any more. :)

Jared got to play tennis and golf. He was SO sore when we got home. lol. Jared went golfing with Wes and Austin. It was Austin's first time. I hope he liked it! He played tennis with his dad, his sister Tara, and her husband Jed. Tara and his dad left after an hour and he played with Jed. He won! But Jed is a very tough opponent, so he was pretty happy about that!

Our niece Amber took these tennis pictures. I am SO impressed!

The stairs at the cabin were pretty wide and had carpet at the bottom. The gate wasn't big enough so we let Ryan crawl up and down as he pleased. He did slip twice. Once he slipped and bit his lip. He was bleeding pretty badly. :( Another time he slipped and cartwheeled down the stairs. He didn't get hurt, but was pretty scared. BUT, He is a pro now! No more gates for us!

Can you see where he bit his lip?

Ryan got to spend lots of time with his cousins. His cousin Jace is 5 months older than him, so I know they are going to be great friends! He also spent some time with Grandpa. He can now say Grandpa and knows what it means. He will sign it too. In fact, we stopped by Big Jud's on the way home and he saw some old guys. He started saying Grandpa and wouldn't stop saying it. It was so cute!

Ryan with Grandpa and Baby Brayson.

There was lots of silliness up there. If you know Jared, you must know he gets even worse around his family. He is quite the funny man. It's all good though because we all love him. Here he is being silly. Wes wanted to join in the fun too. :) (Blackmail pictures, anyone? lol)

On the way home we stopped at Big Jud's, Home of the One Pound Burger! We split one and it was super good. Ryan was so cute while we were there. He loves to look at people and make the biggest smiles. They are hilarious! There were tons of toothpicks in the ceiling and he would look up and say dog and arf. I don't know what he was thinking, but it was funny. We love his little personality. I mean BIG personality! lol.

We had such a blast as you can see! I can't wait for next year!