No matter the weather

Today rapidly turned into a rainy Sunday. Quite the contrast to yesterday which began a little cloudy then slowly transitioned into a bright, humid, scorcher. This was the first chance Carol and I had to start the deck building project that we've been planning for a couple of years. First step though was moving the dog pen over further away from the garage. We began by taking down one end of the clothes line then removing a 8' x 14' area of perfectly good grass, which we removed in rectangular pieces that we may find a useful place for later. The photo on the left is where we left off at Saturday evening - we'll border it with concrete blocks then use some old patio pavers for the flooring before we disassemble and reassemble the dog pen to it's new location.

Today, unhindered by the rain, cousin Donny and his wife Deb held their annual family get together. This is the third year we've attended and a large number of people came in spite of the weather. This was the first year Ian has come with us. A lot of relatives hadn't seen him since he was a little guy so he was involved in a lot of introductions and explanations of what each relation was. As usual everyone bought some food to share - a lot of tasty stuff. I made it a point to eat too much. My family that were there were Mom, sister Kathy, daughter Lindsey; brother David, daughter Melissa and son Danny, so there was a lot of catching up and joking around there. Others I visited with were aunts and uncles, Dixie, Arlene and Gerald, Don. Cousins; Ike and wife Judy, Wendy, Ronnie, Tony, Laurie, Steve and of course Donny. I was very remiss in taking photos. I didn't grab my camera until well after most of us had eaten so I only have a few shots here. Some didn't come out well at all.

Mom, Ian and Carol.

Tony's son Taylor with Dave's son Danny.

Me and Mom.

Because of the rain most of us stayed under cover but there were some in the pool and others got in a game of horseshoes. I think at this point of the summer many of us were ready for a family get together no matter the weather.