{ballet + family reunion}

I have a few things to document but I'm not in the mood to do a few separate posts. So instead I'm doing a mega-post with a million pictures! 

First, Gracie had her first ballet classes last week. Her teacher, Mrs. Katriina, held a dance camp for 4 days. It was honestly one of the sweetest things for me...watching my daughter in her pink leotard dancing ballet! My heart melted every day. Finally Jared came on the last day because I was telling him how cute it was. Grace got to dance with her cousins Kate and Claire too! Even better!

Here she is, ready to dance.

 She's waited for this day for months now. She always has me sing the "ballet song" (a song from the Nutcracker) while she dances around the house. She loves to dance.

 Here are some action shots in class with her cousins...

 doing "pretty arms" : 

This last weekend we headed to American Falls reservoir (in Aberdeen) for the Jones Family Outing.

We had a wonderful time, like always.

We got to take my parent's tent trailer to stay in. It was nice and comfortable camping in that thing! We loved it and it proved very nice for the first day when it was pouring rain. The first night was non-stop lightning and the loudest thunder I've ever heard until the wee hours of the night. Somehow we all slept ok considering.

Gracie loved playing with all of the kids. She was really the only kid that we had to stop camp in order to form a search party for. She's such a wanderer and it made me a little nervous being 200 yards away from the reservoir. Luckily I caught her a couple of times before she made it to the water and when the whole camp was looking for her, she was hiding in Grandma and Grandpa's tent. Here is the little kid's coloring table:

 Kristi did a good job of keeping her eye on the little kids! And she and Lucy entertained each other for a lot of the reunion...she's the best aunt!

 On Friday we drove to Indian hot springs. The girls LOVED swimming! Grace had on a life jacket and would swim by herself in the deep part of the pool. She has no fear. She also went down the waterslide a few times. Lucy loved just splashin' away with her cousins. It's a really fun pool...

 When we got back to camp we played a few rounds of volleyball (those Jones's are good at volleyball!), then we started the talent show. Our talent was playing twinkle twinkle little star and I hope they call me on a mission by hitting these colored pvc-type tubes on our heads. They each play a different note so it makes a song...:)

 Another family did Fear Factor.

Jared did a whipped-cream pie challenge where he had to find a piece of gum in the whipped cream and blow a bubble. 

Tesha beat him....

 This talent was totally awesome. Gary and Deb's fam did a choreographed dance to "Your Love is My Drug". They were pretending like they were driving in a van (Gary was the driver). It was hilarious and one of my favorite Jones family talents EVER! 

 The next morning we took pictures of the families. 

I gave my camera to Abram to take our family's picture and he snapped this one of Grace:

 Here is the Chad Jones family minus Kiley, Eric, Kinsley and Aila who we missed!

 Our little family...keep in mind this is the last day of camping so we do look a little dirty and rough :) 

Love this reunion. And I promise to all of you Joneses that I'll have that Jones family outing song learned one of these years :) here is the big fun Jones group...