Photo Day

This last weekend my family all got together to get photos taken for my mother as a surprise christmas present. This presented a little problem in that she knew I was coming down to do a PartyLite show but that I wasn't coming down to see her. Not good. She also knew that Mason and Austin were going to be with me. Then she found out that Cameron and Darin were coming up to Council Bluffs and that Donnie Guy and his family were coming in from Fremont. Not a huge deal because it is close to the holidays and we could all be shopping at the same time. Then she found out that Marianne and her family were going to be meeting us at the mall and that Cameron would be taking Morgan home. She knew something was up so she decided that her and Dad would just go to Grandma Shirley's for the evening. Since they were "kid free".



So there we are taking our huge 19 person family photo and mom peeks her head around the corner. I was honestly surprised that we could keep it secret that long. No one slipping. Her figuring it out on her own. We all did really good. She usually ends up cornering one of us. Then again the only one close enough for her to corner is Cameron and she isn't always the nicest person so mom probably couldn't tell if she would be lying or not.





Me - Marianne - Cameron
Darin - Donnie Guy

We are all starting to look older. It is about time. Maybe one of these days they will stop ID'ing me when I buy minor prohibited stuff. I don't think I will list all the ages. Way too depressing.




Jesse - Donnie - Racheale - Jesse (younger)
Darin - Courtney - me holding Mason - Austin holding Daniel - Morgan - Ricky
Marianne holding Hunter - Major - Cameron holding Breanna and Isaac - Faith

I know all the kids just look thrilled. To get that many to smile at the same time we settled on all the adults smiling and the baby not crying. Darin is hiding the bottle and burp rag. You can barely see the bottle in his one hand.

We have really exploded in the last 10 years. For those of you who don't know I will give the break down.

Morgan 10
*Emily 8
Major 7
Daniel 6
Isaac 4
Breanna 3
Hunter 2
*Qwentyn 1
Mason 6 months

*Darin's two aren't pictured. Stupid ex-wives. He wouldn't have this problem if he could just stay married.


I know those of you that counted the number of people actually in the photo know that there were more kids than what is listed. Donnie Guy's girlfriend, Rachaele, had her three kids there. Jesse, Courtney and Faith. I have no idea how old they all are. I do know that Courtney is the same age as Morgan. I believe they share the same birthday.

After photos we went to Grandma Shirley's for pizza. We only ended up going through 5 larges. Not bad for that many people. All in all the day only ended up costing us I think about 40 dollars. Photos and pizza. I won't count the gas to go down and back because I can take that off my taxes as a business expense. Remember originally I went down for a PartyLite party.

We ended up getting home really late and Austin had to work the next day. It was good. I don't get to see them that often anymore. We talk all the time but that isn't the same. Sometimes it is nice to see their face when they realize you have just insulted them. Most of the time the translation is lost over the phone. The only bad thing about getting together is that one of usually ends up with a sick kid the next day. I won the lottery this time. Mason got pink-eye. So we have had a fun week. But that is a whole nother post.
Until next time.