Grandma and Grandpa's Birthday Bash

Well, it has become quite obvious that I can't keep up...this blogging thang is for (the birds) very organized people out there with orderly and non-chaotic lives---I am just sure of it! So I am not sure what I was thinking! I am about to go on another family vacation and I haven't even mentioned the last one! Either I need to learn to type and upload faster or we (the trinh fam) need to SLOW DOWN!!! I think I know which one...

So even though I am pretty much lousy at this I still do it more than I ever did scrap booking...(which was..umm...Never!) So I may as well keep doing what I am doing--which is better than nothing. Hopefully one day my kids will look back and love all the fabulous things we did together as a family and will overlook the fact that I posted about july after school started in September. :)

The Wooten Family Birthday Bash goes back many years. I can't even remember when we did the first one. I do know that it was before I had Chloe because I remember getting a baby gift when I was pregnant with her...so at least 9 years. The Birthday Bash started because our family is scattered all over the US (and used to be all over the world), and remembering niece, nephew, cousin, grand children's bdays was tough and pretty much impossible to travel to all of them not to mention trying to mail out all those gifts each year! So, my parents have a weekend each summer when we cook out and have a HUGE birthday party for all of the grandchildren--11 in all! (Grandma really didn't want it to end on an odd number but it was up to me to produce grandchild #12 and Jeff was not interested---can you believe that!)

So we have hamburgers, hot dogs, chicken, potato salad, cole slaw, tons of dessert, and the occasional congealed salad (be afraid...very afraid...one should never eat something that is called" congealed"--it just sounds bad! just call it jello for crying out loud!) I mean the Wooten family does love to eat!!! And then the kids open presents from grandma and grandpa and all the aunts and uncles. It's great...just like Christmas in July! My kids absolutely love this Wooten family tradition and I am so glad that we get to see everyone usually twice a year--Christmas and Birthday Bash! I love that my parents came up with this tradition--and I am sure when it started that no one knew it was destined to become a "family tradition". But isn't that just what family is all about...finding time to be together, in spite of the distance and difficulty or cost to get there. My kids probably think it's about the presents right now, but I think they are already starting to see that the joy of being with people you love and are connected to is better than any gift they can unwrap. I know they will grow up with wonderful memories of being with family each summer---Thanks Grandma and Grandpa!