Early summer family fun

Lots to report on from the last two weeks of activities. Memorial Day we took nephew, Aaron and his family and in laws fishing to Willow Springs. Besides being a busy holiday weekend, the area was filled with law enforcement and emergency personnel to locate two drowning victims from the day before. JB launched the boat and took Aaron, Joey and Rod out to our usual lucky slough.

The rest of us settled in on the shore to see what we might catch from the rocks.

In the middle of the morning we were happy to see the fish stocking truck come to unload some homegrown trout!

Look at those nice trout!

Although this picture doesn't show all the fish jumping everywhere, we moved from the shore to the dock to see what we could haul in.

We managed a few but Jakey got a really big one!
All in all I think there were a total of 6 or 7 that got cleaned and sent home with the boys to enjoy with their Grammy and Papa!

Next on the agenda was to have a short overnight visit with Brent and Jos, as they were on their cross country trip. They had just picked up their car that was shipped from Maui to LA.

Good bye Hawaii. Hello Illinois!

They're traveling to Illinois via Texas and Iowa! Safe travels.

Toni came to visit a couple of weeks while her family planned to go to Rocky Point for a mini vacation without her. She's just making herself at home on top of the glass picnic table.

She's looking to come inside.....but that's not going to happen.

We went on daily walks but not without some excitement. One of her hobbies is to chase squirrels and lizards)! When she spies a squirrel...oh man...I have all I can do to hold onto her leash with both hands. The first encounter was no big ordeal, as there were no houses around. But the second time she drug me into a yard, with the owners on the porch laughing at me. We were headed towards a fence and some big honking rocks. I finally got a hold of her collar but I was huffing and puffing. It's hard to describe my thumping heart! I did get her under control and brought her straight home because she was now grounded....for a day!

So as I said, her family went to Rocky Point last week for five days of sun at the beach. They parked their toy hauler beach side and the boys proceeded to dig and look for critters.

Dev was content to sit in the shade, stay dry and dig.

Three beach bums armed for adventure!

Dil with a teeny fish. Do you suppose it lived?

Logan with a baby crab.

Another one captured!

They got "inked". Hope the tats are gone by now! I'm sure we'll hear all about their vacation.

And meanwhile Brent and Jos made it to Waukon on Thursday to see all of my family. It just so happened that the Mathis family reunion was on Saturday so they joined in the fun before heading to Rockford, where Jos's family lives.

My three sisters, Marilyn, Jane and Peg (holding grand niece, Ava) enjoying the reunion festivities!

The other major event is the Wallow fire that is raging uncontained in the Springerville-Eager-Greer area. As of today it's burned over 400,000 acres and undoubtedly will surpass the Rodeo-Chedeski fire that we had here nine years this week. We've been lucky that the smoke has blown away from us so we're not affected.

Next up---the grandboys will be coming later this week to stay for the summer! I'm sure we'll have lots of topics for future posts!