Wonderful Weekend

The last couple of days have been fairly quiet around here. But it's a quiet that follows a long, busy, and very fun weekend. As usual, with long, busy, fun weekends, we didn't take many pictures because we were so busy having fun. So here's the rundown along with a few, mainly non-descriptive, pictures.

As Friday, May 22, dawned, so also dawned the fabulous idea that we should have a family of 10 stay with us for the weekend. A couple of phone calls later we were hurrying around the house to get it ready for an Englund invasion. However, as late morning approached, the eldest daughter at home (that would also be author of this post), bowed out for several hours having been previously invited to an afternoon of visiting and volleyball at the Beatty farm. So off I went on my little excursion leaving my family to do the rest of the work on the home front. Pictures of volleyball? Nah, I didn't even bring the camera with me! But, if you are really very curious, you could skip over to Dawn's Blog and check out her pics of the day.

So, around 5:30pm I arrived back home, in time to watch Joanna get the last pizzas through the oven, set the table, and enjoy dinner. Then the guests started to arrive. A number of the married couples, and a handful of the young adults, in our church have been going through a video series on child raising. I know that might sound rather dull, but I've certainly enjoyed the study - as well as the discussion times before/after each segment. Last Friday night, was one of the evenings to get together to watch the video, and the usual crowd arrived. But accompanying the regular selection from the Englund family were the rest of the Englunds. And thus, the weekend was kicked off!

After our study time was over and those returning home had done so, the rest of us stayed up rather late visiting. Oh, I nearly forgot to mention that in addition to the Englunds, we also had Ethan and the three young Del's here for the night. Saturday morning during the breakfast hour a prodigious number of pancakes were consumed by the 21 residents and guests of our home.

The morning hours sped away as we cleaned up, practiced music, and headed outside for volleyball, croquet and visiting (I really wonder how many pictures of us playing volleyball in our yard have made it onto this blog - but in case you don't remember what it looks like, here's another!).

The morning and early afternoon passed along pleasantly enough, but there was a marked change around the time the clock struck 2pm. Suddenly sports equipment, picnic supplies, first-aid items (just in case), and various other perhaps seemingly random items, found their way into various vehicles and were soon transported (along with a host of human cargo) to our nearest favorite park. Why for, askest thou? Why, what could it be but a Christ's Church Saturday Special, organized and hosted by some of our favorite people: Josh & Abbey.

2 divisions of "Home Run Derby", relays, puzzles, water balloons, kickball, softball, an "air show," picnic dinners, live entertainment, and more, made up the fun of the day! Oh, yes - the tug of war... we broke the rope on the first tug, leaving both teams sprawled on the ground wondering what had happened. But in the end the split rope came in handy for jump-rope, and its inspiring variations. Well, "inspiring" may be a rather lofty word, but if you have ever attempted doing push-ups while jumping rope, you may have found the exhibition to have been inspiring...

If you're interested in seeing more pictures, you can turn to the ever-reliable blog of Dawn to find some more!

But I'm only to Saturday, so I must move this along. Saturday evening the Englunds were back at our place, so despite the activities and exertion of the day we again stayed up into the later hours of the night, talking, laughing, singing...

Sunday morning arrived quickly, and we were all off to church! But this was no ordinary Sunday - this past Sunday a couple of the men were installed into the office of Deacon. So after the service we said goodbye to the Englunds, and headed home to host a couple of other families at our place for dinner (along with our own extended family crowd), and spent the afternoon visiting. I will only add that nobody stayed up late on Sunday night.

Then came Monday. And with Monday arrived a few little blonde Erbers to spend the day with us. We also received an invitation from the Hills to come over for volleyball and Memorial Day dinner at their place. So, not having had quite enough social life for one weekend, we of course accepted and headed in that direction - the little blondies along with the rest of us. We had a wonderful time - thanks, Hills! The Blondies spent that night with us, Tuesday was cello lessons and errands, as well as laundry and cooking. Wednesday we packed up the guys and they hit the road west for the first major RV event of the year (thus the pictures of the crew heading out in the last post). In case you want another picture, here is one of them pulling out of the driveway:

And that just about brings us to today. I wish I had pictures from yesterday, but I don't, so you will just have to imagine a couple of photos of lovely plates of food - I went to a gourmet cooking class! Among other things, we made some really yummy Grilled Asparagus and Chocolate Chip Cannoli...

Right now the house is quiet, and we anticipate it remaining somewhat so for the rest of the day, but of course, you never know what grand and wonderful idea might enter one of our heads!