Mama bought us plane tickets to come to her family reunion at Yosemite National Park. She’s turning 75 this year and as many of her children, grandchildren, and other family members who could come were getting together at her favorite place to celebrate. In the end 4 of her 6 children came and 16 of her 20 grandchildren. Plus her only living sibling, her younger sister came with her 3 children and 6 grandchildren. So there were 34 of us total including a couple spouses. We got 6 housekeeping cabins all in a square and had a wonderful time hanging out together. I hope we can do it again in a couple years.
Flying to California
We had fun flying to California. At our layover in Dallas we met up with Lori coming from Indiana. A gate agent insisted we make her a sign and welcome her properly even though we’d just seen her the week before. So we did and it was a lot of fun. He even insisted we take a picture with him.
Off to Yosemite!
My siblings all met up at Mama’s house and then we packed the food, firewood, sleeping bags and camping chairs and off we went the next day to Yosemite.
Eating dinner outside on the front deck of Mama’s house. At Yosemite: braiding Kaitlyn’s hair who is braiding Makenna’s hair.
Yosemite Falls
I’ve never seen Yosemite Falls dry before and I’ve gone to Yosemite most summers growing up. I guess we’ve never gone that late in the season before or it was an overly dry winter and spring. We were all kinda sad to not see the raging waterfalls. But we enjoyed the afternoon playing in the pool of water there.
Out and About
Each day we went out and saw some sites like the nature center, Ahwahnee Hotel, Camp Curry, and Glacier Point. We also played in the river every afternoon. The weather was perfect the whole week– a little on the warm side with highs in the 80’s and lows in the 60’s, but not bad. In the evenings we sat around the fire and ate dinner, played games like how well we know Mama, played baseball, sang, and told stories. It was so much fun! See the vlog to see more of our great times!
Hiking Half Dome!
Brady took his 2 oldest kids plus Brandyn, Derrik, Toad, and Kaitlyn to hike 16 miles summiting Half Dome and back down. It took them 12-13 hours but they did it! I wish I could have gone because I haven’t gone since I was a kid and it’s so much fun! Meanwhile most of the rest of us hiked Vernal Falls and hung out for the day. My kids hung around camp, went to the library (Naomi had to take a test for nursing school) and played in the river.
Last Morning Pictures
The last morning we did a baby race with the 3 toddlers. Then we said our goodbyes and most of us went to Mariposa Grove before going back to Mama’s.
Mama with 16 of her 20 grandchildren. Alexis couldn’t come because she was just finishing at the orphanage in Ecuador and then leaving for London study abroad that Monday. The 3 others who couldn’t come were my brother Ben’s kids. One of them was graduating from something in the navy in Florida so they were there celebrating that.
Mariposa Grove of Giant Sequoias
After leaving Yosemite National Park we spent a few hours hiking through the Mariposa Grove of giant sequoias. They were amazing! I love trees so this was always one of my favorite things to do when we visited Yosemite as a child. I haven’t been since 2012 when I took my first 7 kids.
Some of these pictures are of the Grizzly Giant, the Clothespin Tree, and the Faithful Couple. The last picture is Thomas with 2 of my sisters and 1 of my brothers and his wife and 5 kids. They got there after my crew (in the top pictures) and hiked together.
Back to Mama’s and Then Home
After 5 days in Yosemite we reluctantly went back to Mama’s house. I mean, we love her house, but it was hard to leave beautiful Yosemite and my cousins who left from there back to their homes in San Diego and Utah. Plus my college girls left from Yosemite to go to Utah too. Spencer and Naomi came back to Mama’s as well as my siblings, so that was fun. We loved eating meals on the deck, playing baseball in the yard, and hanging around chatting. Then 2 days later we flew back to North Carolina. What a wonderful trip it was! I’m so grateful everything worked out great and we all got to go.
Kaitlyn’s blisters after hiking Half Dome with shoes on. When she got to the top she took them off and hiked down barefoot. She’d rather hike the whole thing barefoot but thought she should wear shoes (she rarely wears shoes–this is why!)
