the collard reunion extravaganza

 

We spent last weekend up at the Collard cabin in Fairview with the whole Collard clan.

The weather was beautiful and the food was amazing.

As usual, we ate ourselves silly. That’s usually what happens at the cabin, especially when other people are cooking such delicious food for us.

When we found out the reunion would be happening just two weeks after Louisa arrived I was a little disappointed.

Initially I thought there was no way I was going to be able to make it, but I have been feeling so good and Louisa has been such a strong little baby that we decided we’d make the trek up there.

I was once again my anxious self and when we started packing and getting ready to go I got overwhelmed at the thought of camping with these two little girls.

We didn’t think there would be enough room in the cabin for us so we were preparing to stay in a tent outside…I wasn’t sure I was up for it.

Minnie has never slept anywhere but in her pack n’ play the last year and half of her life and I just wasn’t sure how she was going to fare.

Luckily for us enough people brought trailers that there was room in the cabin to sleep because it would have been way too cold to sleep outside.

We ended up sleeping in the living room and unfortunately the first night proved to be pretty disastrous.

Minnie was so confused at the idea of sleeping next to Robert on the floor, totally unconfined, and had a hard, hard time falling to sleep.

In fact, she didn’t sleep most of the night.

Louisa had one of her first hard nights of sleep as well (lucky for me!) so I was pretty much up the whole night with one or the other of them.

I wanted to cry, but somehow we survived to see another day.

I was still happy we went up because pretty much all of Robert’s family was there from all over the place and it was good just to spend time with them.

And man, that Fairview Canyon is seriously beautiful.

Much of the family ran in either a 10k or 5k just up the road from the cabin on Saturday morning and most of the rest of us met them at the finish line to cheer them on.

Is it just me, or do other people get teary cheering people on during races?

I’m telling you, it’s not hormones. I have been like this my whole life. It’s kind of embarrassing.

It was really fun to see everyone come in and Minnie was having the time of her life cheering with her cousins.

We spent the rest of the day relaxing, eating lots of delicious food and playing games outside.

All of the kids had such a good time playing with each other, picking flowers and swinging all day.

I was really glad Minnie got to spend so much time with them.

After a delicious dinner and some s’mores that night we came in for yet another tough few hours of sleep.

Minnie woke up throwing up for about an hour and a half.

Robert was a dream dad and held her and stayed with her while she worked through it, getting thrown up on and everything.

The joys of parenthood.

Minnie is a pretty light sleeper in the mornings and generally wakes up when she hears us rustling around.

The next morning she was out like a light in the middle of the living room until nearly 10 am.

All the kids were running around the cabin making lots of noise and she wasn’t bothered a bit.

Poor thing was zonked from the night before.

In spite of the hard nights, I’m really glad we went.

Robert’s brother and his wife, Mikey and Nikki, made the trek to Utah from LA and we love spending time with them.

Minnie has actually really taken to Mikey, which I think is funny.

Maybe it’s because he and Robert kind of look alike? I’m not sure.

One of my favorite moments was when Minnie had Mikey reading her a Barbie book for a good five or ten minutes.

It was pretty cute.

Robert’s sister Liz and her kids and grandkids also came down from Idaho and we rarely get to see all of them either.

It was just really nice to all be together in such a beautiful place.

Hopefully if we do it again next year we’ll be a little better prepared and I won’t have just had a baby.