cross country meet up

i have a couple cousins who live way out in washington state, way up by the canadian border in a little town called linden.  about a dozen or so years a go, back when i lived in salt lake city, i was able to take a great road trip and visit them for a couple days.  i havent had the chance to see them much since then, but diana and i had the chance to meet up with mike recently.  their oldest, cody, is now in college (yikes, i'm old!  but thats ok because they are older...) and he goes to trinity college in chicago.  cody is on the cross country team and had an away meet in michawaka.  his dad, mike, flew out for the weekend to see his son and go to his meet.  my aunt ruth and uncle don (cody's grandparents) decided to come down at cheer him on as well!  they invited my mom to join them, so we got the chance to spend an evening with all of them together!  unfortunately the cross country meet was too early in the day for us to go to that, so we missed out on seeing cody, but we did get to spend some time with the rest of the gang.  we met up for dinner and got to chat for a while.  ledger was in fine form, being such a good boy for us, giving us the chance to talk in peace, and still be adorable and do super cute things to melt his mema's heart!
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labor day fever

we had a great time at sandy pines all weekend, but on sunday ledger was feeling pretty crummy.  we tried to make the most of it, but he was feeling pretty under the weather.  he was running a bit of a fever and all he wanted to do was cuddle- and play with his ears!  when our little guy is tired or not feeling well, he always fiddles with those huge ears of his!  we spent most of the day just holding him tight and making him as comfortable as possible.  monday the fever continued, so we packed him up and took him home, hoping that he would be able to rest and recuperate a bit.  he was a perfect angel on the way home, he was so exhausted and beaten!  it took another day or two after we got back, but eventually he started acting like his ol' energetic self.  though, i'm pretty sure he had worn his ears raw by then!
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labor day potluck

as is the sandy pines tradition, all the friends and families from sandy pines came over to mom and papa's place for a potluck.  it was fun, as always, to see everyone again.  its funny to see just how many children there are now in the group- its like they are taking over or something!  ledger had a blast getting to play with a bunch of other kids and babies his own age.  and of course, the food was fantastic!

ice cream and rc cars!

after dinner we decided to go and treat ourselves to an ice cream cone.  we got there and the line wasnt too bad considering that it usually leads out the door about 100 or 200 feet!  the thing that has always shocked me about this ice cream place is the size of their cones.  we usually order a baby cone size and it ends up being about 5 inches tall off the cone- i couldn't imagine how much ice cream it would be if you ordered a large!  yikes!  as we ate we wondered around the play area on the beach.  we spoiled ledger a little bit by giving him a lick.  he enjoyed it and the walked back to play, would immediately turn around and want other lick!  i think we have an ice cream fan...
after the frozen treat, we went for a little ride around the park on the golf cart.  as we were driving by, we noticed that there was a bunch of people with their cars at the off road r.c. track.  ledger had never seen that before, so we stopped and got a chance to check it out.  i'm not sure who was more impressed by the car stunts- ledger or papa!
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that pesky squirrel!

soon after we arrived saturday morning, we headed over to the flea market.  we wandered around and had a great time just checking stuff out.  one of the neighbors had a booth at the flea market and were selling sunflowers, so my mom got a couple to decorate the deck.  we headed back to the trailer and mom set them up on the table outside.  we sat down and had a bite to eat.  after the meal we looked out at the deck and there was a pesky squirrel who seemed to have gained an extra measure of courage (or stupidity), he scampered up to the table and pushed over the vase with the flowers in it- and then ran off!  what a jerk!  mom was beside herself, mad as a hornet about the gumption of that crazy squirrel- diana and i were beside ourselves as well, but mostly because we were laughing so hard!

labor day weekend visit

with the week over, we were finally able to head up to grand rapids to get our little guy and spend some time with the family!  we headed up friday night and picked him up from tim and jills place- it was so nice to see him again after all that time!  oh, how he'd grown in just those five days!  we soon tucked him in to bed and followed quickly after...  in the morning i got up with him and got to spend some time with him playing around the house.  mema and papa were at sandy pines, so it was just he and i finding stuff to play with at the house.  i made him some breakfast and realized that the baby chair was still in the basement, so we made due with what we had: a big boy chair.  he was totally up for it and did a great job sitting still and eating his oatmeal like a big boy!  pretty soon diana got up and we all got ready for the day and headed out to sandy pines to start the weekend!
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