Rockaway Beach 2009

Back home again! We spent last week at Rockaway Beach for the annual Heimsoth Family Reunion. For more than 40 years, Jason's extended family has been going to this small town near Branson for summer. It falls during the week of Grandpa Lambert's birthday (at least it has as long as Jason can remember). Currently, Jason's grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins and their children make the trip to spend time together. We rent a group of cabins in the small town and can go back and forth to Branson conveniently. Jason gets to spend time with his extended family and play cards while the girls get to play with cousins that they only see a couple of times each year. Washers games are set up and can be heard clanging away for hours. The pool usually has a crowd of swimmers and grandma's cabin is always open for a bite to eat.

My kiddos particularly like the freedom that comes with this vacation. As someone said around the picnic tables one night "normally we tell the kids not to go with strangers but we get to throw that rule out the window here because everyone is family". There is a group of little ones that are Jocelyn and Olivia's age and the kids have a blast going from cabin to cabin taking stock of all the best snacks to raid. They also spend time trying to gather money from relatives in casual to downright blatant begging so they can play video games (okay, that was my oldest one primarily).

The girls hate to leave and their first question when they get back is typically about when they get to return. Here are just a few pics to remember the week.