Lodi

Last weekend, we drove the 7 hour (it would be more like 5ish without a little person) drive up to Lodi, CA, to see some precious family on my dad's side of the family who I have not seen in 10 years for some, and much longer for others.  Here is one great treat Abby Jane got on the way up and down in between naps, snacks, and running breaks... getting to watch DVD's!  She loved it since it's not something we do at home.

This is my Aunt Jeanne (my dad's aunt) and my mom, who met us up there.  Aunt Jeanne is the consummate grandmother, and it was medicine to the soul to stay in her home and spend the weekend with her! She is a precious, precious woman.
Aunt Jeanne hosted all the in-town family and the cousins who were flown in for a big dinner on Friday night- there was something like 30 people there, and it was SOO fun to see everyone and reconnect!  For the family who are reading this, the entire Lewis family was there- all of Dad's cousins, and all of their children and grandchildren.  The Fine family was also there, minus Melanie (who's in VA with her baby girl and husband).  Vanessa and Bryan drove up from Paso Robles (the town where we went wine tasting our first Jan. in CA), Dianna flew up from Long Beach, and Julie flew down from Seattle.

Here are the kiddos present for the big shindig, who were hanging in quite decently given that it was 8:15 when this photo was taken (hence the PJ's on Abby Jane and the Grant on the other end)... from L to R: Grant (13 months), Tyler (18 months), Emily (3), Madeline (5), Alexandra (3), and Abby Jane.

On Saturday morning, we joined my cousin Mark, his wife Michelle, and their little ones Tyler and Emily at the park to play and have a picnic on a beautiful day.

Saturday afternoon, Mark took a bunch of us cousins wine-tasting- Lodi is all wine country, a fact I somehow missed in all the childhood trips to California... though I'm not sure how, since there are vineyards everywhere you look!  My mom joined us for her first time to wine-taste.

Aunt Jeanne watched Abby Jane while we went out, and this is what we came home to.  How snuggled in does that kid look?  After I picked her up, she leaned back down for Aunt Jeanne!

We had dinner with the Fine family on Saturday, cousins of mine who we spent every Thanksgiving at either their former home in Cincinatti or them coming down to Atlanta from as early as I can remember through my high school years.  Here I am with three of the four Fine girls- there's only a 6 year age range between the five of us, so we got into all kinds of trouble and fun growing up!

We came away from our time up there SO glad that we went and thoroughly convinced that if we lived in the same town as all these sweet cousins, we would really love spending time together.  It was neat to see the grown-up versions of the kids you ran around with as a child and really enjoy being with them in this adult stage of our lives!