Grateful Friday

I keep thinking about our family reunion.  I loved it so much.  I loved talking to my cousins.  There are 11 girl cousins approximately between the age of Marianne and Olivia--so about a five year span.  If you don't think there was a lot of mean girl drama amongst us growing up, you were not one of 11 girl cousins.

It is completely gone though.  Vanished.  I truly loved talking to them.  We talked about anecdotes from childhood. My dad was at the door and Leslie went to tell her mom but refused to open the door because my dad was so big and scary// Catherine said my dad would call her mom and Catherine would answer the phone and my dad would ask, "Why did you call?" and she'd get completely flustered because she hadn't called.  I think what it comes down to is my dad can come across as scarier than he actually is and he also will ever be the waggish youngest brother.

Here's a picture Jennifer took at the anniversary party and I love it for many reasons:

My mom was showing us a book her college roommate had brought of pictures of their freshman year of college.  (Enoch is sporting that apron because he sliced all the roast beef for the party which was no small feat.)

I love my beautiful cousin Leslie and her husband Joel talking to my dad in the background.  Leslie is laughing her wonderful laugh so you can see she recovered from her terror of my dad.

My cousins and I also talked about the need for reading glasses (Margaret has a contact that corrects for near and one that corrects for far and I'm intrigued) and adult children.  These are the girls I played dolls with and Dukes of Hazzard.  (Somehow we were all Daisy Duke and I'm not sure how that worked.)

How did we get old enough to talk about reading glasses?

We talked about Wells, where we all went to school, and getting treats at the Frontier Market and Quilici's.  Catherine and Margaret would get raw hot dog from Quilici's when they shopped with their mom.  What?!?

Leslie said that they always were more savvy than the rest of us.  They knew things like the actual names of sports teams.

It's true.

I'm so grateful for cousins and the way they make me feel grounded and connected and remind me of who I am and where I came from.

***

I'm grateful for friends.  Wednesday Adam and Dave both had to be at the stake center at 7:00 and Nola wanted me to weigh in on carpet samples so we arranged that I'd come over at 7:00.  We sat on the floor amidst carpet samples and pretty much talked about everything except carpet.  One of the samples was the carpet we just had installed so we walked over to our house to look at it.  We talked awhile inside then walked outside and talked about the neighbors' construction site that may someday be something more than an eyesore but isn't yet.  We talked about our yards and plants and then ended up talking in the middle of the cul-de-sac and it started to get dark but we kept talking.  Then headlights came up the street and we moved aside because it was Dave, closely followed by Adam so we went back into our various homes.

It was 10:00 pm and we'd surely made zero progress on carpet choices.

I'm grateful for friends and summertime when I can stay out late chatting.

***

I have started spending a little time in my classroom.  It's at the overwhelming stage but it also makes me so happy.  I love being in that place.  It feels like my magical little kingdom (if a magical kingdom had hideously ugly cabinets from the 70s).