Slade Reunion July 2007

Every other 4th of July Roni's Mom's side of the family--The Slades--have a huge family reunion. It involves camping for a week and getting really dirty and smelly! It it usually over the 4th of July, as it was this year. It takes place in her home town, Eagar, AZ and right outside of town is the campsite. The area is known as the White Mountains! town is the campsite.

















It was super hot and there were no fires allowed. Our campsite was not a designated campsite, so all we could have was Gas grills. Not even charcoal! So we have not got to test out our new dutch oven yet--but Coleman has made me promise him we will before the camping season is over! Towards the end of the week rain was in the forecast, but we were all a little skeptical because %20 is not a high chance! But it did rain, and it poured! It was nice after that. The rain really cooled things off and kept the dust down around camp. Makdie LOVED wearing her raincoat and especially her rain hat! She was not in the rain that long though because the lightning and thunder were too close for her mommy to handle. So she got put in Aunt Michelle's and Uncle Chooch's camper until it stopped!






















One morning we walked down to a little stream. Makadie loves to play in the water. The stream was part of the Little Colorado River. It was a nice, but HOT hike!















Makadie keeping up her rock-throwing practice!! She has quite the arm!

















We also did some White Mountain fishing at Big Lake. We did not catch anything but had a lot of fun. Makadie enjoyed getting wet and playing with the 'ball-ball' (a fishing bobber) in the water! It was quite windy and the wind was blowing towards us, so the bobber always floated right back to her!

















It was so windy that Coleman kept snagging his line, and had to go out a few times to un-snag it! Here is on one of those adventures!















Makadie kept wanting to go 'simming with Daddy, and git Daddy's ball' when he went to rescue his line that he decided to take her out a little deeper for a swim! She loves the swimminh pool and has no problem being pulled along and floating. But for some reason with her life vest on she got pretty freaked out when she could not touch the bottom of the lake anymore. So we had to get one picture of the distressed child!














Having lunch and drinking a juice box in the 'Pooh Camping Chair' as Makadie calls it!















After catching no-fish we took a drive. We drove up to Reservation Lake. It was quiet and beautiful, not windy and populated like Big Lake. Since it was on the reservation we needed to have had a reservation fishing liscense. Since we had already paid $17.25 a piece for the 1-day AZ fishing liscense and did not catch anything, we decided not to fish there. But we enjoyed the view and took some pictures.