A Family Thanksgiving

This year, we spent Thanksgiving with much of my family at my uncle Bobby's property in Concan, Texas. Its a beautiful little piece of Texas we'd never visited before, and we had a great time enjoying the outdoors, nature, and family.

Team Danger shared a house with my cousin Julianne, her husband Mark, and their six month old baby, Graham, aka the Next Generation in the extended Caran-Cary-Coffman-Cox-Olsen-Rouquette-Swanson family. Our house was along the Frio River, and the boys loved walking across every morning to try and skim stones across the river (they always sunk, so clearly we need a bit more practice). They also enjoyed finding "gun" rocks because if Team Danger can find a way to turn something into a weapon, they will.

Back at the main house were my mom, BeBe, Margaret, Cheryl and Glenn, and Bobby. And Bobby's three dogs, Cheryl's two dogs, and Julie's dog. Not to mention the roosters and chickens, which Alex particularly enjoyed chasing.

Ryan's highlight of the weekend was baby Graham. He just adored his latest little cousin. Ryan loves little children, and has been asking us nonstop when we'll have another baby. Since that isn't likely to happen, having a new cousin was the next best thing. He hung out with Graham non-stop.

Where Graham was, Ryan was not far behind. ;)



On Thursday, Alex thought the temperature was just right for an impromptu dip in the river.

Bobby has an old-fashioned trolley, and he took us for a ride after the turkey dinner. This was right as the cold front rolled in, so we definitely put the "chill" in chillax by the end of the ride.

On Friday, we went fishing at Garner State Park, which is about ten minutes away from Frio. Alas, the fish were not biting, but we had a lovely time enjoying this beautiful fall in the park.

 

 

(I know, this is a gazillion photos, but I just love them all, and since I've just purchased 20GB of photos to use with this blog, the photos, they-are-a -comin'.)

The best part of the weekend was getting ready for Bobby's "Its a Concan Christmas" extravaganza, which is sponsored by the town of Uvalde, but is on Bobby's property. Alex dressed up as an Elf, and shockingly, he just LOVED being an Elf. He wore that sucker for about six hours straight - longer than he has ever worn any costume at one time.

Three bands performed that night, and there was also petting zoo, a pot bellied pig, fake snow, more trolley rides, hay rides, and lots of vendors showed up, which gave us the chance to become the owners of yet two MORE lighted swords/lightsabers. I do believe we now own more of these suckers than the Jedi Council . We roasted smores at our own private fire pit, and we even got to visit with a drunken Santa. The "real" Santa called in sick for the night, so after a few rejections from some of the more sober folks - I'm looking at you, Carl - Bobby picked the only person intoxicated enough to agree to dress up and play Santa for scores of children.

 

 

  

Santa looks particularly festive in this photo with baby Graham.

We had a great holiday weekend with everyone, and our only regrets were that we were missing our California clan: Beau and his family, as well as my cousin, Lauren (who lives in San Diego). Still, I think that this marks the most of our family together at a non-wedding event in decades, which is definitely a reason to be especially thankful.

And if you haven't seen enough photos of the weekend, check out Julie's blog of the family fun.