Fisher Family Reunion 2013

In the midst of our whirlwind move we had a family reunion.  It was a nice break step away from the craziness at home and relax for a bit.

We love our family reunions!  They are just the best!  Every 4 years we spend a week in the mountains in Colorado at a YMCA camp.  This year we were at Snow Mountain Ranch.  We spent the week doing all sorts of fun activities: archery, canoeing, crafts, mini golf, roller skating, climbing the rock wall, zip lining, and just having fun visiting with everyone.

The boys and I had to leave our house at 3:30 AM to catch our flight.  Boy were we tired!  Rich flew in soon after us and met us at baggage claim.  After waiting forever for our rental car we headed up the mountain. It was fun to see everyone and get settled.  That evening we had a camp fire and chatted.

Sunday we went to church in Granby and probably doubled their attendance!  There were 57 of us that invaded their tiny branch.  We didn't want to kids to get dirty outside beforehand so we all crowded into our room to watch some VeggieTales.

After church we played with cousins and visited.

Once a day all of us would gather together in the conference room and have a family home evening.  We always had a great lesson and a fun game--and learned more about our family.

On Monday we were all set to go swimming and we discovered that the pool was closed for the day!  Instead, we played in the little creek just outside where we were staying.  The boys had a great time.

A few of the nights we had a campfire after dinner. It was nice to sit around and visit.  The first night Jacob started the fire on his own with just one strike of his flint and steel!  Another night William ate well over 20 marshmallows... I don't know how he didn't get sick after that.

We loved being out in nature,

mini golfing,

and rock climbing.

With this rock wall you didn't have anyone on belay... your weight just pulled you down which meant you had to weigh at least 40 pounds.  James barely weighed enough and Alex was a few pounds under.  We were originally told that you have to be 4 years old though and Alex was already excited to try climbing... so Rich added a few huge rocks into Alex's pockets before they weighed him!  He only wanted to go up a few feet anyway so it worked out fine.

William had a lot of fun and tried a few times and made it about half-way up the wall!

 Rich even gave it a go.

James was determined to get to the top--he was not giving up until he got to hit that buzzer!

Since he barely made the weight minimum if he lost his footing he would just sort of hang there until he was ready to go again and then he'd grab onto the wall and keep going.  It was hilarious to watch and some of the cousins started calling him "Spiderman."

He was on the hardest side of the wall when I tried to coach him through to the top but he got too frustrated.  In the meantime I got to the top and started rappelling down and then heard him cry, "Mom!  Why did you leave me?!"

On his third try he finally made it to the top--something that many of the adults couldn't even do!  He was pretty proud of himself.

We also had a great time in the rec center (and the guys had fun playing basketball there at night.)

We had fun making hiking sticks

and dressing up at the homestead.

One morning Rich took James and William to do some archery.

Wednesday we had a few hours for canoeing.  I think that nearly everyone from our group showed up for this and we all had a blast!

 

 

 Someone brought a bin of tennis balls which were used to throw at each other.  The boys had a great time reaching into the water to collect them and throw them at everyone.  Honestly, it made me nervous that we were going to tip over every time!

Rich was able to go on the newer, taller zipline which sounded like so much fun.  I took William on the smaller zipline.  James desperately wanted to go even though he wasn't old enough--we thought he might be able to go anyway.  Turns out that he couldn't go and he was so sad.  We assured him that he would've been so awesome if they would have let him go.

And everyone loved these trikes.  Jeff wanted to ride them so badly that he made us huddle in the shed hoping that the storm would pass.  

 

 The storm didn't pass but we made sure to come back another day.

 Henry and Caden had a great time just playing around.

Even pregnant Rachelle got in on the tricycle fun!

I know this post has passed the point of being lengthy but I just want to remember it all!  We also took the grandkids geocaching, went swimming (which was too cold!),

and Amy and I ended up being twins one day--totally by coincidence!  We didn't even know we owned the same shirt!

The meals are always great--and it helps that we don't have to cook or clean up!  The kids had a great time making drink concoctions.  Elise was brave enough to try the ones that had chocolate milk in the mix too!

And a bedtime story from Grandma is always a treat.

And we even got a shot of the "babies" with the matching blankets that Elise made for them when they were born.

The very last day we took a little hike.  It was the perfect length for a bunch of kids and a very pregnant lady.

 They were happy hikers all the way to the waterfall.

 On the way back William, Olivia, and James would hide along the trail and jump out to surprise us!  We really had no idea where they were hiding... they were good at camouflaging themselves.

 

 We had a fantastic time chatting during the day (and way into the night... apparently we earned a reputation at the last family reunion for being the night owls!)  I love getting a chance to become reacquainted with my cousins, aunts and uncles!  We are so blessed with such a wonderful family... and we can't wait to get together in another 4 years!