Family Reunion

Our trip to Iowa started out rough! Let's just say I am now thoroughly convinced that the airline business is, by far, the worst in this country and there is not a single thing we can do about it, short of orchestrating a nationwide strike and all committing to drive everywhere. Since that isn't going to happen, I'm pretty sure we are going to continue to be at the airline's mercy and have to sit back and let them attempt to ruin our vacations everytime we decide to fly. I won't go in to all the details, but I will say (if you don't already know), buying your tickets months in advance does not mean you are going to have a seat on the flight. It's more like buying a lottery ticket...you give them hundreds of dollars and maybe they will give you your requested number of seats, side-by-side, on the flight that you bought the ticket for and get you to your destination on time - not 24 hours later.

Ok, I'm done. As painful as it was at the time, the truth of the matter is, I really think it was a blessing in disguise. We were refunded the majority of our money for the plane tickets and then were put up in the Hyatt in Chicago (SOOOO nice). We would have been paying for a hotel room in Iowa that night, so saved money there too.

When we finally made it to Iowa, we had a great time. There are 11 grandchildren on my mom's side (10 cousins plus me) and all but 1 of them were able to make it to Iowa for the family reunion and early celebration of my grandma' 80th birthday. All of my mom's sisters and her brother were there and lots of my grandma's cousins and even one of my mom's cousins were able to make it! I got to see family that I haven't seen in years, Dylan met more of my family and Madison met all kinds of new people!! One of the neat things about this get together too was that there were great grandchildren. It was the first time that all of the cousins (my cousins and me) got together with our families. The group just keeps older and bigger and it was a lot of fun to meet all the little ones. My youngest cousin turns 21 in September which means I am getting SO old!! I hope we can manage to get everyone together at the same time again before our babies grow up! With everyone spread out all over the U.S., it makes it hard.

Not only were we able to see a ton of my family, we had a surprise visit from my dad! We did not expect him to be there, but Katie and I were happy to see him and have what little time we did have with him and Chase. Madison got to meet them for the first time too.

It was a short weekend, but one I know we will remember for years. I can never get enough time with my grandma and to have that time with her and so much other family is something I cherish greatly.