ray reunion - day 6

cause you should always give your babies chips in the morning.

we learned from cami's brother kerry, sis-in-law shelby, and the doot-noodles (our new term for cousins of cousins) that iowa is known for it's geodes - cool rocks with crystal kinda things inside - that's my super technical description of them. we weren't able to go geode hunting with the larson clan, but on monday morning we set out to do it ray style. the larson's had invited us to go, but it was the day we had our temple appointment so we weren't able to make it. but surprisingly to me, alexis and christian really wanted to go! they thought it sounded cool, and since they weren't super psyched about anything else on the trip, i definitely wanted to make it happen for them.

we drove through the cute old town of keokuk, iowa.

across the mississippi from keokuk and back into the small town of hamilton, illinois. we were super surprised when we pulled up to a regular old house with a geode sign outside.

a nice lady with a 3 year-old clad in only underwear greeted us, equipped us with sledgehammers and buckets, and we were off!

down the hill and through the woods of their backyard.
 only after everyone got thoroughly doused with bug spray. 

and even then we got eaten up.

goin' huntin'!

i was excited about the excursion, but i did not plan well for me or my girls.

 it was so muddy and we were so not ready for that.

mr. sledgehammer.

we basically climbed up and over and down and around all sorts of forest brush and trees and through a muddy creek bed.

delaney would have probably loved to play and splash in the mud, but i wasn't willing to find out.

the little's didn't do any real geode hunting, but they had a fun adventure exploring.

see what i mean about us not being prepared for mud and climbing?

it was so weird, there were just these round geode's scattered everywhere in the mud and muck.

"ewwwww! mud!"

it was hard to know what we were looking for since none of us had ever gone geode hunting before. so we went ahead and broke some open to check our work. it was very cool!

frankie wasn't really loving the mud either, surprisingly.

she went from lexi to zoe to whoever else would hold her.

we filled a bucket and a half and called it good. then we got to go up and hose off and check our loot. in the midst of all of that, the 3-year-olds decided to cross the street and go exploring by themselves. oopsie! uncle james went to retrieve them.

our goods! we laid them out, hosed them off, then divied them up.

and then it was time for some sonic! i love that place!!!!

deliciousness!!!

quick stop at wally for return trip snacks and big girl underwear because... frankie pooped on the big girl potty!!!!! we're not accident free yet, but she has poo'd at least 5 times on the potty. i can see the light at the end of the tunnel!

on our way home we stopped at the montrose landing, where the saints came after crossing the mississippi as they left nauvoo. you can just barely see the temple looking across the river.

a better view.

 it must have been so sad for them to have to leave their beautiful city!

some day it would be fun to do the whole trail.

after all the hunting, sonic, wally, and history, it was back to the hotel for some cousin swimming and mommy laundry and packing. 

got all cleaned up and we were off to nauvoo again! since our car only sat 5 we always had to farm out at least 2 of our kids. addie and lexi went with uncle mike, aunt cami, and cousin bronco (apparently cosette was too difficult for addie to say so she dubbed her bronco?) and stopped for ice cream (lucky!), frankie rode with uncle james and aunt stephanie and got some fun cousin time (lucky!), and we had a little extra room  in our car.

we had already walked all around nauvoo, so we just kinda hung out.

 the plan was to eat at the nauvoo house, but alas, they are closed on mondays.

addie looks like she is up to no good!

we hung out in beautiful nauvoo and planned out plan b for dinner.

i could get used to that view. i couldn't get used to everything closing at 5pm every night though. i take that back, there was a gas station pizza place and a hole in the wall that we were advised against eating at that were still open.

i <3 br="" hand="" holding="">

we finally decided on a little mexican place near our hotel. the vincent's (chantell's parents) joined us for our party of 24.

 

after dinner i wanted a group shot so chantell set everyone in their places.

the whole dang crew!

after dinner i broke out some leftover poppers from 4th of july, so we hung out in the parking lot and threw them. i'm sure everyone loved us!

of course the last day is the day we try to cram in all the group shots we didn't take before. 

cousins!

only missing glen's 3 girls.

hard to get a good pic of all these kiddos. so wiggly!

and da' 5 boys with their dad.

brotha's!

silly brotha's.

and da' girls. we cooperate a lot better so we only needed one shot. ;)

and we'll round things out with a beautiful 1-year-old - the youngest of the whole crazy crew.

 
it was a fun and busy last day!