Cox Family Reunion in Las Vegas!

My mom's side of the family has a family reunion every 2 years and each time a different one of the the 10 kids in my mom's family is in charge of it.  This year my Uncle Stephen and Aunt Rebecca were in charge of it.  They were living in Las Vegas (they moved the week after we all left) and they wanted everyone to come to them for the reunion.  So that's exactly what we did!

Our first day of the reunion, July 8th, we had a day at Lake Mead.  Uncles Brian and Doug brought their boats, Uncle Dean brought a jet ski and we rented one other jet ski.  It was so much fun!

Sadie, Sydnee and Maggie

It was so hot outside, being in the water was the only way to keep cool.

Poor Maggie was sweating so bad she couldn't even get comfortable enough to take a good nap.

So she just chilled here for a while.  We called it her "rest" time because it didn't actually turn into nap time.

We got a bit of a bonus going to Vegas for the reunion, because not only did we get to be with my mom's whole side of the family, Spencer's brother, Dave, and his family live in Vegas.  So that night we met up with them and went out to ice cream together.  

Maggie was absolutely in love with Stephanie here.  They had so much fun together!

This video is classic Maggie.  She will laugh at any little kid who gives her the time of day.

Going back to the hotel and resting that night was so nice.  We were exhausted. 

Here's Maggie resting with Sydnee and Mary Jane

Our rest on Friday night was super important because we had a date with the Las Vegas Strip Saturday morning.  We had about 3 or 4 hours to see everything we wanted to see that day.  Neither Spencer nor I had ever been to the strip before, so we set out with Maggie's stroller and started walking.

This is the Bellagio conservatory gardens or something like that.  I don't remember exactly what they call it, but it was really cool.

The flowers and basically everything were gorgeous

I especially liked these parrots

As we walked out of the Bellagio to go to the front and watch the fountains, we had the perfect photo op to get a picture of the Eiffel Tower.  Never thought I'd get one of those in my lifetime :) 

Bellagio Fountains.  AWESOME!

After hitting all the Bellagio stuff we went walking down the strip to find ourselves the M&M store.  On our way we ran into this.  There is a full on motor cycle coming out of this sign.  I was pretty much in awe.

After a lot of stopping and sight seeing plus a little lunch at PF Chang's, we finally got to the only other place we knew we HAD to see.  The M&M store!

Can you believe all these M&M's!?  I thought I was in heaven!

We went and saw the 3D movie there.  These glasses were quite attractive.

After that, Sadie and Sydnee joined us and we went to town taking some fun pictures with all the M&M gear around us.

Here's my sweet family looking out on the strip.

We got a great picture with Yellow here.  Maggie was a little weirded to see a big yellow M&M walking around.

As we left M&M World there were a whole slew of characters out for people to take pictures with.  Sadie just HAD to get a picture of Bumblebee and Spider Man.

By this time we needed to get going, but in order for us to get back to the shuttle we still had a really long walk ahead of us.  We had a little over 30 minutes and we literally booked it the whole way.  Suddenly it started raining REALLY hard - all while we were still trying to book it to the shuttle.  We had not choice but to keep going and just let ourselves get soaked.  Maggie was in the stroller and we were trying really hard not to get her wet - but she was not a happy child.  She also hadn't really eaten since we'd gotten there, so it just wasn't a good situation to begin with.  But when we finally made it - just before our shuttle left - it felt good to sit down and relax a little.  I also got to feed Maggie - so she was happy too.

This is what we looked like after arriving at the hotel.

Yeah, we were pretty wet :)

That night was the last night of the reunion and we had so much fun with everyone there.  We played some great games and had some wonderful food.  It seemed really short when we got right down to it, but it felt like we accomplished/got to do a lot while we were there, so it was really nice to get to go home and relax for a little while after all this.

Daddy Loves You

July 6, 2011

Dear Maggie,

 Daddy loves you

 He loves your smile and those pretty little eyes

 He also loves it when you let him do funny things with your hair

 Just remember that when you get older

 Love, Mom

The 4th of July

Every day I'm getting closer and closer to actually catching up here - Gotta love it :)

So we left Pocatello in the early afternoon on the 4th and as we were driving back home to Logan we were invited to a little celebration with our friends Jessica and Marcus Bruce.  We were kinda bummed to have to leave the family on a holiday and not get to hang out that night with anyone, so we were super excited to make plans for the night!

The party was at Marcus's parent's home.  They had a little BBQ and treats and most especially they had this little pool set up.  Maggie LOVED it!

 Her favorite thing to do was lean to the side, like so, and play in the water.  It was adorable and I loved that she was so content and happy in there.

 We were so glad the Bruce's had this little bumble bee tube and that they let Maggie use it.  It was much more fun that way!

 After dinner and everything we got to sit in the cul-de-sac with all the neighbors and watch the awesome firework show.

 Seriously, the 4th of July is one of my favorite holidays because I LOVE fireworks.  There's something magical about the bursting lights and sounds.  It just makes me happy.

 Maggie slept right through these fireworks on Marcus's mom's lap.  It was really cute.

 Love Him!

The End

Rogers Family Reunion

July 1st - 4th

The very next day after we went to Lagoon, Spencer and I cleaned up my parents house (they were coming home that night), packed up our stuff and headed for Pocatello, Idaho for the Rogers Family Reunion.  

The Rogers family consists of Spencer's mom's siblings - Aunt Pam, her husband, Uncle Kim and Uncle Ken and his wife, Aunt Delmi - and their kids and grandkids.

I feel like we had 500 family reunions this summer, but we didn't waste a single second at any of them!  And what's a family reunion without a family dance?

The Boot-Scootin' Boogy

Grandpa dancing with his girls - Brianna and Jayden

After the dance on Friday night, everyone combined their fireworks and we had a great show!  I was a little worried about how Maggie would deal with the pops and crackles of it all, but she actually seemed to really enjoy it.

Betsy and Brielle

Maggie enjoying the show.

Cute Jordan was cheering and jumping up and down with excitement with all the fireworks going off.  It was really cute.

The show ended with everyone getting their chance to wave around some sparklers.  

Saturday was full of games fun for everyone.  This slide kept the kids busy for hours!

While Brianna didn't do any sliding down the slide, she cheered happily for each person as they came zooming down.  We got a kick out of it!

As usual, Maggie was a perfect little angel.  

When the weather got a little warmer that day, everyone headed to the university, where Betsy (and helpers) had set up this gigantic water slide.

Measuring over 100 feet long, there was quite the line of family wanting to take their turn racing down the hill.

As the day went on, everyone got more and more creative in getting down the hill.

Spencer even helped Addison get down on while standing on her feet.

This was really cute to see all three of the VanRoosendaal kids gathered around Maggie.  She loves all the attention.

That night we went up the mountain to look at some property owned by the Johnson brothers.  This was the sunset that greeted us.  It was absolutely gorgeous!

On Sunday morning church was at 8:30 in the morning.  I didn't think we'd made it that early... but we even got there on time!  I was so proud!  Poor Maggie didn't get to eat before we left though - so I had to feed her during sacrament meeting.  We hadn't been there long before Jessica (Spencer's cousin) and her daughter, Clair, joined us.  Clair is only a couple weeks older than Maggie and the two of the are adorable together.  So we just had to have a little photo shoot with the two of them.

It was so easy to get Clair to smile, but Maggie was being a bit stingy with her smiles because she was a little too distracted with Clair sitting the same chair.

That afternoon was spent playing games and talking with everyone.  This was my favorite game that happened.  These boys were adorable and I loved the idea of them playing chess at such a young age.  I'm not sure that they REALLY knew what was going on, but they thought their moves out and made it look like they were pretty smart.

Later that night, we had a talent show.  Maggie's talent with Daddy was one of the favorites :)

Tatianna playing the flute with her grandpa, Uncle Ken, accompanying

Jamie playing for her girls, Corinne and Paige, on the violins.  They did so well!  I love little girls on the violin!

Spencer serenading the crowd

Probably the favorite of the night was Vivian teaching everyone a dance that she taught to her 2 year old dance class.  I loved it!

Uncle Kim, Aunt Delmi and Uncle Ken doing Vivian's dance.  It was perfect!

One night here as I was getting ready for bed, Maggie got a crazy burst of excitement.  So I took a couple videos of her.  

This was one of the most fun weekends we've had all summer.  We love our Roger's cousins and loved the chance we had to see all those that came.  It's just so great to be surrounded by family and by people who will always love you no matter what.  We are so blessed to have such large families because the love that comes with them exceeds their size ten fold, and we are so grateful for that.  I know reunions are hard to put together, but I'm grateful that there are people willing to put the work into them because it is so worth it.  Thank you to everyone who helped out with this reunion and every reunion we've been to this summer.  We love you all and have loved the time we've been able to spend with you!