Mangum Reunion Part 1

We just returned from the 2008 Mangum Reunion in Boston/Plymouth, Mass. Most of my siblings call that home (though none of us live there), and my parents lived there for 15 years. Twenty-four of us (including two pregnant women) packed a large beach house in Plymouth for a week. It was an awesome time, and for my brother Marc's family, the first time they had met Lena. It was great to be with the family and for Lena to play with all her cousins.

I'm going to do this in several installments, mainly because there are some many pictures and I don't want to overwhelm our blog-reading public of 20 people. So here they are in order of what went down.

We flew into Boston on the 4th of July. Here's Dad and Lena enjoying the plane ride. Lena travels pretty well when she's not puking. (Long story, but let's just say that I would recommend bringing an extra pair of pants in your carry-on when traveling with a 18-month-old.)

We spent the first day with Kathleen's mother Bonnie, who was babysitting for Kathleen's sister Kristine and her husband Jason who were in London (Kristine and Jason live in the Boston's Back Bay, a wicked cool neighborhood). Above is Lena playing with her cousin Julia. They had a lot of fun playing together, and unlike the last time they met (in February), Julia did not become mortally afraid of Lena.

On Sunday we went to the Boston Temple, where my (Adam's) parents had played a major part in the open house and then worked in as temple workers before they moved to Texas in 2002. Here is Lena with some of her Mangum cousins (from left to right) Max, Hayley, Trevor and Michael. Lena often crouches in pictures, like she's preparing to receive a fastball.

Here's Lena with her cousin Hayley enjoying the temple grounds.

Let's just saying that getting a cousins' picture was a little difficult. Jake and Max are running out of this picture (which was the best we got with our camera). Amanda is holding Lena, David is holding Bria, Michael and Colin are standing to the right, and Hayley, Trevor and Myles are sitting.

Lena bonded quite well with her Mangum cousins. Amanda was a godsend; she watched Lena at various times during the week and seemed to enjoy it. That allowed Kathleen and I to enjoy some adult conversation. I think we need to fly Amanda up for a week. On this trip up to the temple, Michael also entertained Lena for almost the entire trip (he was riding in our rental car) by singing primary and kids song. He'd be welcome up here with us anytime as well.

I will post more later. Man this is going to get long. I'm only through the first full day.