Oh what fun!

It was a quick whirlwind of a weekend, but wonderful.

Friday we went to Nevada and helped prepare for the big party.  It was all hands on deck and what do I do now, Marianne?  She was stellar in her role as our leader.  When you match Marianne and Olivia, you pretty much can accomplish anything I think.

Love those girls.

My dad hung the quilt we made them for an anniversary gift.  I was concerned about little kids getting jam hands on it (we weren't even having jam) and Emma and Mark said they'd guard it.

My cousin Hannah sent me this picture:

(They didn't do that during the party.)

Olivia and crew had wrapped 250 bundles of silverware and after the party she counted the remainders and there were 41.

So, yeah.  We had a lot of people.

There was a lot of family and familiar faces.  I introduced Emma to Elaine Swanson who was my 6th grade teacher and I was her teacher's aide my junior and senior years of high school and I wanted to be her when I grew up.

Later Emma told me that she felt like she'd met a celebrity because she'd heard so much about Elaine Swanson all her life.

Then I met some new people.  A few couples from my parents' mission came.  A woman who they'd never met in person who lives in Las Vegas came.  They are Pathways missionaries and she is one of their students.  One of my mom's college roommates and her husband came. 

It was a party!

I loved catching up with my cousins.  The older I get the more I love catching up with my cousins.  

My aunt Mary and uncle Steve brought my grandma to the party.  I found this picture on Mary's Facebook page (I go to Facebook occasionally to steal pictures from my nearest and dearest).  It's my uncle Joe (my dad's brother) with my grandma.

Long before I was born; before my parents were married, the two families were connected.  I love that.

Marianne had given us all shifts and Tabor and I had the last shift when the food service had kind of died down.  My kids and Tabor called me the shift boss and I ran a tight ship: me mostly telling Tabor and Mark to behave.  

I am pretty sure it wasn't a coincidence that Marianne gave Tabor and me the last shift when the food service had kind of died down.

Here my parents were cutting the cake:

We tried to get them to smear it on each other's faces and they both just said, "No."

Then there were twin Herculean efforts:  to clean up and to get my mom to sit down.  We finally managed both.  I love working with people I love in a united cause.  It just feels good.

And my feet were tired.

Saturday my dad and Adam and I went to what everyone started calling The Home Place after my grandparents died:  my grandma and grandpa's house.  Walking around on the lawn I could hear the echos of No Bears are Out Tonight which the cousins would play after dark and I could smell the smoke of weiner roasts and my grandma's yellow roses.  I could hear my grandparents calling, "Come again!" from the front porch.

And, I mean, I'm not even sentimental....

Ha.

That feels like sacred ground to me though.

We went to the park in Wells for the reunion where my uncle Drew's family had provided a catered and delicious lunch.  The reunion hosting rotates through the siblings and my dad is up in two years.

We'll be ready.

There was more visiting with cousins.  Wonderful!

My aunt Jennifer shared a history of my grandparents' ranch with us.  I don't care how many times I hear it, I will always be blown away by some parts of their story.

My grandpa worked in the Department of Agriculture during the Eisenhower administration and so they lived in Virginia briefly.  One summer they sent my dad's two oldest brothers, Demar and Joe back to the ranch in Starr Valley to work.  They were 11 and 9.  A fifth grader and a third grader.

I know a lot of third graders.

They put them on a bus and Demar and Joe accidentally landed in Maine.  They got on a different bus and finally made it home.

They were 11 and 9.

When Demar was 12 he headed up the haying operation with his siblings, while my grandpa worked for the Department of Agriculture.

I can't even imagine, but all the native confidence God bestowed on Dahl men is probably a good thing.

I also loved hearing the stories about my grandma who willingly packed up her household to move to Virginia and to move to South Dakota when my grandpa was a mission president and to move to Florida when he was asked to manage a ranch the Church owned there.

Her blood is in my veins.  I so want to channel her strength!

I've heard all the stories and I won't ever get tired of them.

We took the compulsory girl and boy cousin pictures.

This is all the girls, minus six:

Leslie, Sarah, Britta, Molly, Hannah, Marianne, Olivia, Jessica, Catherine, Dixie, Margaret
Me, Elizabeth, Erica, Danielle and Gretchen

I sat in front with the other short girls.

These are the boys, again minus six:

Austin, Micah, Tabor, Ira, Enoch
Jordan, Ammon, Alexander, Jason
Lincoln

Did anyone tell them all to wear blue?  No, they did not.

Here's my dad and his siblings (also accidentally color coordinated):

Jennifer, Claudia, Olivia
my dad, Drew, Joe and Demar

My cousin Leslie told me that the first time her husband attended one of our family reunions he said it was like the Amish mafia.

We relocated in the evening at my parents' house for a weiner roast.  More visiting.  Our family ducked out sort of early to make it back to Utah for Adam's early Sunday morning meetings.

I'm so glad we could go.  You can't put a price on family time.

Family reunion: our first

I didn't get many pictures so I asked Mark to send me what he had.  Helpful.  Thanks Mark.

I got the idea from Marianne:  establish a family reunion tradition now.  We rented a house near St. George for a few days and had a lovely time.

The drive there was mostly Braeden on a Zoom call for a work meeting and Emma frantically finishing a 10 page paper in French.  Gone are the days I had to plan distractions for road trips.  (I still need to pack snacks.)

Once we arrived, we did a little grocery shopping and spent a little time at the pool.  We played golf (the card game) and talked about starting a movie but then it was 9:30 and we all know that's too late for Thelma to start a movie.

Saturday we drove to Zion National Park but the canyon was full and closed.  Instead we drove through the Mt. Carmel tunnel and saw the beautiful scenery and went to the gift shop.  A national park gift shop is only rivaled by an art museum gift shop for awesomeness.

The people at the park told us that they would open up the canyon at 6:00 PM, so we decided to come back.

We returned to our little house and spent more time at the pool.

Anna fits in perfectly with my pale faces

We also watched An Inspector Calls which Braeden and Anna recommended.  It was so good!  We had an early dinner (which turned out to be the first of two dinners) and headed back to Zion.

This time we got in and it was perfect.  The light was beautiful, the temperature had cooled and it wasn't too crowded.

We hiked up the trail to where you enter the water for the Narrows.  It was one of the few times we remembered to take pictures.

There are Braeden and Adam in the background.

Adam took this one of Braeden and Anna.  I love these two together.

These two are pretty great also.

We hit Dairy Queen on the drive back for ice cream and second dinner (depending on who you were).  

Saturday, Braeden and Anna made us breakfast and we packed up and headed to Sand Hollow Reservoir.

Except it was full.

When other options are limited, the great outdoors draws a crowd!  Our second choice was Quail Creek Reservoir.  We set up a little sunshade for me and everyone else went into the water.  I had a good book to read and should have been very happy and satisfied, but I was hot.  The sunshade was also good at trapping heat.  Mark wasn't feeling well because of the perfect storm of changing his sensor and eating breakfast then taking his pump off to swim.  His glucose levels were all out of whack.  We still need to learn ways to make that all work better.

We left the reservoir after only a few hours.  We had lunch in Cedar City and then drove home.  Mark and Emma curated songs.  They had people create categories:  songs I don't like but everyone else does, songs I would listen to if I had to do dishes, songs that tell a story, songs that make me feel vague and uncertain, songs that have a message I endorse, a song from when I was 12.  It was fun and we sometimes sang along quite loudly and we sometimes said, "OK, can we skip this song now?"

I think we will call our first family reunion a success.  Lots of things didn't work out exactly as planned but it was OK.  We were together and we were happy.