I don't have many pictures this week!  It's sad because I saw a lot of people that I don't often see.  I think I am better at taking pictures of my own family.  I need to get a little braver with other people, I guess.  Or insist that they take a picture with my camera, too!

On Sunday we got together for a picnic dinner with all my cousins who are in the area.  It was tons of fun!  More people than I thought showed up!  Even my sister Amy and Maggie brought their families up in order to go.  My daughters had asked me why they didn't know who my cousins were and this gave me a chance to show them.  They were very interested and liked meeting their second cousins and mostly thought it was really cool.  I thought it was really cool, too.  I told them a lot about my dad's side of the family.  I wished my dad could have been there, too!

The only picture I got was when I posed with my sister Amy, and the two cousins closest to our age who we did so much with at family reunions, etc., Wendy and Jenny!  If I ever get access to the other pictures, I will post them, too.

These are all the first cousins who were there!

So, on Monday Amy and Maggie and their families stayed and we got a chance for a great visit!  Chey and Cali still wanted to go to their tennis class, so they brought Kayla with them.  Megan and Becca and Emily went to see a movie and the rest of us went to the Spanish Fork Resevoir.  You can see pictures from when I took the kids two weeks ago . . . I was apparently too busy visiting to take any pics!

Amy left Tuesday morning and Maggie left Tuesday evening.  It was sure fun having them and my kids sure loved being with their cousins.  Maggie even took two of my girls with her:  Megan and Mariah!  They had to finish out our annual "Week with the Gillespies," though this year they did half at the Gillespie home.  They've built some strong friendships there that I think we all value.  I know I do.  :)

Monday was also the first day of the softball tournament for Mariah!  Her team played two games in the scorching heat that day.  Both games went into extra innings but in the end they lost both.  Sad!  But happy, too, since it was very hot!  Mariah played great and pitched during both games.  She also stole home and hit well.  She had a great time.  She's really had fun all season.  I'm glad she told us she wanted to play.  It was fun to watch her having so much fun.

We didn't see Sarah much the first three days of the week because she was working as scorekeeper for the aforementioned softball tournament.  She came home at 11:45 and 10:30 on Monday and Tuesday.  That's P.M!  Fortunately it was on the fields just walking distance from our home.  She had tons of fun being scorekeeper, too.  She made friends with the other scorekeepers and officials and just loved being at the fields.  It's been a great job for her.

Sarah's up in that window!

Savannah heard back about her AP scores and found out that she passed both of them!  Yay, Savannah!  She got 3s on AP US History and AP English.  She worked hard for those and we're proud of her.  She worked this week and even took her cousins to Funfinity while they were hear to buy them each a little something!

While Megan and Mariah were gone the latter half of this week, Cheyenne came to me one morning to announce that she had finished reading five books so far this summer.  That is significant since I told them that for every five books they read I 'd take them for a happy meal at McDonald's.  Calianne spent the whole rest of the morning reading so she could come, too.  We had a fun lunch together!

On Friday I drove down to Cedar City to retrieve Megan and Mariah.  It sounds like they had a great time watching movies, playing games, going to discovery park, and exploring the shops in Cedar City.  Megan even got to go to a church dance while she was there.  Becca and Emily turned 14 this week, so it was their first church dance!  I think they all had a ton of fun.

The only other big news is that Sarah went bike shopping with her dad yesterday to use all that money she's been earning!  She bought herself a beautiful, NICE bike.  She should be able to use it her whole life . . . barring any loss or theft.  I hate those two things!  I hope she'll get a lot of enjoyment out of it.  I wish I'd taken a picture . . .