Porter Reunion 2014

The end of July we met up with extended family in AZ for the Porter Family Reunion near Heber. Bailey, Aubrey, Brandon and Angela flew to Arizona from Utah (the girls had been at EFY) and Joseph, Dan, and I flew there from Washington.  First we spent a few days in the Valley eating all the Mexican food our stomachs could handle.  Tia Rosa's . . yum.  Cafe Rio . . . . double yum.

 After church on Sunday we visited the Mesa Temple Visitor's Center and the grounds of the beautiful new Gilbert Temple.

 It was so hot, but we braved a few pictures outside. Joseph borrowed my sunglasses so he could handle the brightness.

 Then we packed everything up to drive a few hours to the mountains for the reunion. We were CRAMMED into our rental minivan. Every seat was filled and we all had to hold things on our laps. We had to take many more bags than usual because we had to bring all of our own bedding: pillows, blankets, sheets, etc. That was a pain and I won't try to attempt that ever again.

Click below if you want to keep reading

This was an extra special year because Brandon was able to introduce his new wife to the family.

 
Since the last reunion two years ago, Brandon and Spencer both returned home from their missions. And, so exciting - during the week Dallin returned from his mission in the Dominican Republic! Julie and Kent picked him up on Thursday and brought him back to hang out with the entire family. I'm sure he was a little shell shocked by the drastic culture change.

 The "cabin" was large and accommodated the entire family pretty well. Once we arrived we fell into visiting cousins/relaxation mode.  Aubrey was so excited to see her cousin Sarah and to hold cute Olivia.

 There was lots of card game playing,

A rousing game of family kickball,

and good food at every meal.  This was our night to cook: Hawaiian Haystacks and crepes for dessert.

 Now, about Joseph.  He was in little boy heaven the entire week.  He has lots of cousins his age and they ran around like busy, happy hooligans the entire time. They requisitioned the really cool treehouse as their private fort and spent hours hanging out there.  They took advantage of every outdoor fun adventure the cabin offered, including crawdad fishing and endless adventures along the river. In particular, Joseph and Jeffrey were inseparable.

 
All that hanging out by the river resulted in some pretty massive mosquito bites!

A few favorite images from the week:

 
We had a great talent show one night. Many of the cousins performed. Aubrey and Brandon sang "I'm Leaving on a Jet Plane", Joseph played Star Wars while Jeffrey whistled it, and Grandpa called up his own kids and then gave a grandfatherly talk to everyone.

Wheeee - we all rode the zipline! Nate patiently manned the tower and operated the zipline.

  

Dave took interested family members to a shooting range. It was the first time I had touched a gun! I was a terrible shot, for the record. I'm not anxious to try it again. Joseph did a great job, Aubrey is the new Annie Oakley and Dan showed his mad target shooting skills.

 The guns were loud and stinky!

There actually weren't a lot of planned activities during the week. Mostly, the kids ran around and played and the adults played games or talked.

Our goodbye gift as we prepared to leave to the airport was one of the craziest rainstorms I've ever seen. There were lightning strikes very close by. The kids had a great time running around on the covered patio while it rained.  The wind blew the rain onto them and they were soaked. There are few things as fun as a summer rainstorm! We were worried that the precipitous, windy dirt roads out of the canyon would be flooded with water, but they were fine.