Wilkinson Family Reunion

Last weekend was the first-ever official Wilkinson Family Reunion. Because the Texas Wilkinsons make up over half of the clan, (and because everyone was nice enough not to make us drive a super-long-distance with five almost 2-year-olds), the reunion was held here in Central Texas. Jayson's brother, Joel, lives in Ft. Hood, about an hour from us, so between our two houses and an extra bed at Virginia's house, we managed to find room for everybody. There are four siblings in Jayson's family. Jayson is the oldest, followed by Alicia, Joel and Megan. Alicia has three boys: Trevor (6), Andrew(4), and Jake (almost 1). Joel has two kids: Alec (6) and Cora (almost 4). Megan has only been married a year, and doesn't have kids yet. All together, there were 22 of us. We had a great time visiting with everyone over three fun-filled days.



Day 1: Sea World San Antonio & Rudy's BBQ



Despite the nearly 100 degree temperatures and high humidity, everyone had a great time.

The Whole Gang at the entrance to Sea World. Megan, Jayson's youngest sister, designed T-shirts for everybody. If the stroller didn't catch every one's attention, the bright green shirts sure did! They had a picture of an old Vega car on them and said: "Be like a Vega: Endure to the End, Wilkinson Family 2009". (It is an inside joke in Jayson's family--Vega's are known for being horrible cars, but growing up that had one that defied the odds and lasted forever)

The highlight of the day was the Shamu Show

Everyone waiting to see Shamu

Kaiya and Riley

The park had a huge playscape for the older kids, and an enclosed playplace for kids 3 and under. The quints had a great time playing with the big soft blocks.

There was a little pond at the park with a duck family swimming around. The baby ducklings kept climbing on the mother's back. If there wasn't enough room, they would just shove somebody else off. The daddy duck was swimming around too, and even though he had a perfectly lovely back with plenty of room, the ducklings just wanted to fight over the mother's limited back space. I could REALLY relate!!!

Kaydence--her hair was cute at the beginning of the day--I promise. I think the humidity melted it :-)

We traded off staying with the babies so the adults could ride some roller coasters.

After our Sea World adventure, we went to Rudy's BBQ. By this point, the babies were hot, tired, and past their bedtime, so they were quite a handful. While we were at Rudy's, a lady came up to me and said, "I just have to ask, What do your shirts say?....Oh, 'Be like a Vega'----so you're all VEGETARIANS, isn't that nice!" I thought her comment was particularly funny since we were at Rudy's, with a table full of ribs, brisket and turkey.

Day 2: Family Photos, Crazy Glasses and Splash Park

Kristen Duke, my favorite photographer friend, attempted to take family photos. The dress code was black shirts and jeans. I had an unbelievably hard time finding black shirts for the baby girls. Black is not an "in" color for baby girls right now! After all my searching, I have decided that Navy Blue is the new black. In the end, I did find some black onesies with a picture on the front, so I had the girls wear them backwards for the pictures. Several babies were not happy about the photo shoot, so I was pretty amazed that Kristen actually got a few decent shots. You can see a preview of the photo shoot on her photography blog. Click HERE for the whole group shot, and HERE for some photos of the individual families.

Rachelle, Kyndall, Rustin and Kaydence (two words: mother duck)

Everyone did their best to get the kids to smile while Kristen worked her magic! (Back to front: Tobi, Kristen, Megan, Alex)

Rustin was pretty unhappy during the group shots, but gave us his signature cheeseball grin a little later on.

Following the photo shoot, everyone headed back to our house to compete in the first ever Wilkinson Family Crazy Glasses Contest. Sylvia (Jayson's mom) provided a bunch of old glasses (which she found at thrift shops), pipe cleaners, beads, foam stickers and feathers---the rest was up to us. It was pretty funny to see what people came up with. My friend Natalie came over to judge. Megan (in the middle) was declared the winner!

Next we tried to beat the heat by going to the splash park. The boys jumped right in, but the girls, Kassidy especially, were a little bit more timid. (Pictured: Kyndall, Ryder, Kassidy, Kaydence and Rustin)

Kaydence

Ryder

Kyndall

Kassidy

Kaiya

Riley and Rustin

The mostly kids table: All that splashing caused us to work up an appetite, so we had a pizza party picnic in the park. By this time it was pretty windy and all the kids plates kept blowing away. Thank heavens I married an engineer, who never leaves home without his duct tape! It saved the day :-)

The mostly adults table.

Day 3: Church, Dinner and Dancing

Sunday was Father's Day. After church, we headed up to Ft. Hood for dinner at Joel and Tobi's house.

The baby table: Kassidy, Kaydence and Kyndall

The Kid Table: Riley, Trevor and Kaiya

More Kid Table: Cora, Grandma and Alec

Riley and Trevor

After dinner, each family was supposed to perform a dance number (ours was Hot Potato, Hot Potato by the Wiggles). Jayson's sister, Alicia, had the best moves of the night!

Kassidy shows off her moves

Grandma and Grandpa's number involved all sorts of crowd participation exercises--including push-ups.

Wilkinson Family Reunion