Earlier this month my older brother, Eric, & his family came to visit from Iowa. They spent a week here & we were able to do a lot of fun things together. The last time the entire family was together was a year ago when my Grandpa passed away. I didn't get to spend much time with them since Jeff & I were just getting back from our cruise to Cabo & they headed home the following day.
This time they got here on Saturday & that evening we had dinner at my parents' house with some of my mom's side of the family. We stayed the night there & on Sunday we spent the day visiting & had dinner again that evening. We didn't do much the following few days but Wednesday everyone got together at our house for pizza & it was also Eric's birthday so we had cake before going to the Roller Drome in Nampa. Eric's wife, Jessica, is on a roller derby team & their boys are also pretty impressive on skates. They pretty much schooled me with their skills, although I must say that I'm better on roller skates than on ice skates...
Even though in the 3rd grade I was roller skating on the cement basketball court at recess when my shoelace got wrapped around the wheel. I ended up face planting into the cement, chipping one of my front teeth. I got to leave school for the day, but I had to spend the time at the dentist. I would've much rather stayed in Mr.Diggs' class than get my tooth fixed.
Anyway, it was a lot of fun, especially to watch Ethan & Kamden their first time on skates. They were pretty adventurous & Kamden even fell, breaking one of his skates, but he just got back up & tried to keep skating with half a skate on his foot.
Our plan for Thursday had been to go to the zoo, but the weather wasn't exactly great so we tried to think of something else to do. My mom mentioned the aquarium, which I hadn't even known existed. But we found it & had a great time, even though we bought dead little fish to feed the sting rays & baby sharks (which were freaky) & they were so full that they paid no attention to the fish we kept trying to interest them in.
And, for some reason, there was this guy with a giant lizard. I'm not sure what a lizard has to do with an aquarium, he didn't really fit in with the jelly fish, octopus, or sharks, but the kids were pretty fascinated by him.
Friday night my sister & her family came from Oregon & we were finally all together. We had dinner at mom & dad's followed by a game & a white elephant gift exchange, then got back together Saturday morning at our house for brunch. That afternoon we thankfully had a break from the rain, even though it was still freezing, & were able to get some pictures of all of us for the first time ever.
That evening we celebrated my nephew, Logan, earning his Eagle Scout Award complete with a slideshow, cake, & all the Eagles in their Scout shirts. I'm not sure why my dad isn't in this picture, he was all decked out but somehow we missed him.
Congratulations, Logan!
Then we said our good-byes since the Iowa Van Leuven's were heading home the following morning.
We miss you guys!
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