Celebrating Mother's/Father's Day with Mom and Dad

A couple of years ago we determined that given all of our families' busy schedules and the complications of trying to honor all of the moms or dads on any given Mother's Day or Father's Day, the best plan for all of us with Mom and Dad Alexander is to come up with a day somewhere in between the two holidays to get together to celebrate them both.  Today was the day.  I'm so glad the sun came out in abundance to provide the ambiance for a beautiful, relaxed bar-b-q and hang out time.

The food was plentiful and filling - and combined with some raspberry/rhubarb pie, key lime pie, and rice krispie treats created stomachs that were very full and led to a little nap time for Michael and John. 

 

They were tired....

No worries - it led to some fun conversations with just Mom and Dad and Michele and I..interesting ones that I have to admit might not have been appropriate to have had at full volume (due to Dad's hearing) so close to our neighbor's fence.  Michele's recent teachings of sex education in the middle school can lead to some very colorful stories! 

Eventually, we joined the kiddos outdoors for a very loosely structured game of badminton. 

Clearly, our boys were proud of this particularly achievement....I love how Brayden's strutting his little chest out....

It's all fun and games until three of the birdies end up on the roof.  Mikayla to the rescue!!!

It never fails, if an adult steps foot on the trampoline, it's like a magnet drawing every child to join that person.  This time it was my turn.  I never tend to last long - it gets a little nutty and dangerous in there...

I'm so glad we made today happen.  Mom has been battling a rather aggressive chest cold all week and was a little skeptical about how she'd do.  However, we kept things really laid back which, it turns out, was what we all needed.