Just the 14 of us

For the first time in a long, long time all of Blake's immediate family were under one roof, our roof, this past week. Including the two babies, there were 14 of us. Blake's brother's family came from the D.C./Maryland area, Blake's parents from South Carolina and Blake's sister's family from St. Louis/Nashville.

Peyton delighted in her cousins, Belton, 10, William, 9, Jeffrey, 6, and Sarah, 3 months. Belton indulged Peyton in dress-up, tea parties, and french braids all week. They were pals, to say the least. Every morning Peyton would wake up and ask if her cousins were still upstairs sleeping, and if we went anywhere she would always ask if her cousins were coming. If she spotted them while getting into or out of our cars, she would say, "Oh look there's the cousins," or "There's a cousin." Once, when Jeffrey was climbing on the monkey bars, Peyton said, "Jeffrey is a good guy." I think she meant that he was good at climbing monkey bars. Since they left on Thursday, she has been using the word guys a lot. That must be what "big girls" say.

It was an action-packed week. In short, here are some highlights:
1. Two afternoons at the YMCA pool, which equals countless trips down the frog's tongue slide

2. Monkey Joe's indoor inflatable bouncy thing place, which has pretty darn good pizza as it turns out

3. Making five batches of peach jam = so. much. stirring. I think I dreamed about stirring peach puree.

4. Popsicles and bubbles and water play in our back yard

5. Dressing up in matching (patriotic, no less) clothing for a family photo at Bicentennial Mall

6. 10 p.m. Catan every night (playing Settlers of Catan is pretty much a given where three or more Moodys are present.) Not pictured.
7. Dinner downtown and an evening walk across the Cumberland River pedestrian bridge (still in our matching clothes), where we found a geocache hidden under one of the bridge posts.