In July we had the chance to have both of Kevin’s brothers and one of his sisters and their families over to our house for a BBQ and family time.
17 cousins
There was good food, some Koob, some frisbee, some volleyball …
Lots of sitting around visiting…
I do always love to see how the older cousins accept my boys …
It makes me happy!
Ricky was a bit more into reading his current book, but we made him at least look somewhat social…
We also did some fireworks that night. It was going lovely until the very. last. one.
That’s the one that flipped over after the first launch. It then spun in the road shooting fireworks in all different directions! They went into all of our neighbors’ yards! Neighbors who had come out to watch with us fled back into their houses … one neighbor ran inside yelling “it’s gone all bad!”
I was sitting in the grass with Bobby when it went “all bad.” One of the older boys grabbed Rusty, who was also near us, and I managed to run for cover behind Marc’s van with Bobby. Just as we got behind the van, Marc apparently grabbed Bobby (I don’t actually remember that) and at that same moment, a firework shot UNDER the van and right into my thighs! Thankfully, it bounced off my legs and hit the ground before it popped. I was able to turn my head to one side, so only one ear took the sound – there was silence and then ringing in that ear until the next day. I thought I was on fire and was about to drop and roll, but before I hit the ground, I focused on my pants and they were only burnt and oil stained. So I stayed upright. Other than my ringing ear, everyone was totally fine and there wasn’t even any actual damage.
It may be a while before Kevin is willing to do fireworks again! Our sweet neighbor came out with popcicles and fudge-cicles because, she told us, sometimes a popcicle makes everything all better.
It seemed to work fine.
Since Daniel was scheduled to enter the MTC in August and all 17 Pendleton cousins were together, we had to get some cousin pictures…
They really are a good group of kids.
And they seem to like each other well enough …
It usually is when family gets together!