River Ranch

After getting home from Canada on Monday evening (one day late thanks to Delta), we packed ourselves up on Thursday and headed out for an RV camping weekend -- it seemed like such a good idea when we came up with it months ago but it is true, we reconsidered our sanity when the reality of it all came to be!  But, it was a fun time for sure.

On our way - karis came down Friday after work!

We had some new folks join us this time, which was a lot of fun plus our normal crowd.  It was the Acostas (new), Hilliards (new), and then Johnsons, Cochrans (plus Emily from New Zealand - such a cool accent!), Reiners and of course the Zs.  The weather was perfect for camping that weekend, we were really fortunate!

Such an awesome picture of the little kids!  These were the smallest of the group!

We had two group suppers - one on Friday and one on Saturday - and it was fun to hang out (we chose Hilliard's campsite as they had a great little campfire / sitting area!) and chat.

Hilliards brought stuff for s'mores - needless to say that was a big hit!

River Ranch has tons of fun stuff to do, so we availed ourselves of the pool, petting zoo, pony rides, rodeo, adventure part, golfing range, archery and more.  We wanted to have the boys go to the clay shooting range, but that just couldn't be fit in alas!

The first afternoon that we went to the petting zoo, the kids were having lots of fun picking up straw out of the black bucket (below) and feeding it to the horse/goats until one of the workers came by and said "that is the straw that they have pooped in."  Ha ha ha, the poor animals and the poor kids who were then horrified!  The expression on Nash's face is just priceless below!

shocked, laughing, all a little amazed - but cute as can be!

They were making a ponytail unicorn! :)

Such a pretty little goat with its special coloring!

This deer would no joke lick you - and licked Addison's hair and leg!

Licking her pants!

She held the bunny several times

This would make her daddy's heart proud!

The one thing about camping is that there is lots of time for hanging out with friends, playing games, fishing, riding bikes etc.  Always fun to see what interests the kids each time!  This time it was fishing as the big hit - the kids were always at our campsite fishing (and releasing them back in) -- good thing we brought a lot of bread!

Playing Rubiks cube race - game from Christmas in Canada!

First morning Kaleb even went outside by the canal and was reading!

Archery on Sunday morning!

Early morning fishing - peaceful!

As the fishing was at our site, the sheer number of bikes at our place was always a lot - it was really fun!

One of the nice things to do there on Sabbath is to go for an air boat ride - you can see so much wildlife from the birds to the alligators, turtles etc and the water is always so relaxing -- it can lull you to sleep!

Ready to go with his life jacket and sunglasses!

Boat #1 ready to go!

While Addi, Amy and the Acostas were on the boat #2!

And sure enough, she was sleeping before long!

The men are of course always happy to be active, so they spent a lot of time playing spike ball, tennis, riding bikes etc.

karis and cole against zach and aiden

Saturday night is the rodeo, which is usually fun to go and see.  They had some new trick roping this year, which was fun.  They always have a calf scramble where little kids can go in and chase the calves and one little girl from our group caught the calf!  Go Shelby!

Hanging out with Dad

After the rodeo, Addison and Kaleb tried their hand at the jumping "thingy" (who knows what the name is) and Addison did the rock climbing wall

The one sad event of the weekend was that Saturday night as we sat eating supper, the kids played a game of tag and one little girl (below) ran into the end of a trailer and split her forehead open - resulting in a need for stitches.  Poor kid - it was not fun and we are sad for her - it was their first time coming so we better make it up to them next time!

Enjoying a candy treat....before the accident.  Thankfully she is healed now