first weekend in august marks the annual holley (my grandpa) manwaring family reunion. and this year my parents were in charge. they decided to spend the weekend at morgan's bridge near fort hall, id. my grandma manwaring and her family had a homestead near here and so they spent every summer there. than, as my grandma's family grew they started spending every independence day weekend at morgan's bridge camping with extended family. this continued through the decades until my grandpa passed away in 2000. so, my parents thought it would be really special for us all to do it again...like the good ole days!
kevin couldn't get away from work, and i knew that i would want to be there for it so i hitched a ride with my parents. since they were the organizers they went up a couple days early. this meant three nights of camping without my husband! YIKES!
it certainly proved to be quite an adventure. we got a late start wednesday night. my parents had my little crew and emily and her baby, collin, with them. we were caravan-ing with jarom and his family and justin and his family were meeting us there. it's supposed to be a 1 hr drive with lots of twisty, gravel, dirt roads. but, it took us 3 hrs and after two flat tires and a SEVERAL wrong turns we weren't all reunited at the camp ground until 3am. it was a circus, but after some magic on justin's behalf we were able to all be where we needed to be.
we were in the car a LONG time!
thursday we set-up camp. thanks goodness some of the allen family came early as well. they were so helpful in getting things set-up and helping my dad. my dad brought a HUGE parachute to put up to provide shade. my grandpa use to always do this too so my dad wanted to bring back that tradition. he'd been working the whole week trying to find a way to get this parachute set-up and nothing was working. we thought we had what we needed and when we went to set it up on thursday the pole broke. but, miraculously these guys were able to find a lodge pole, in the middle of NO WHERE, that was exactly the right height. a miracle...thanks to our grandpa. grandpa was looking out for us and knew if we didn't find a way to put this chute up my dad was going to have a break down. (;
we had a couple bad starts getting it up (and madalyn was almost was smashed by the pole when a HUGE gust of wind came through) but by friday we had it tied to perfection. and it served us well with lots of shade and made a great gathering place.
by friday night we had about 100 people in attendance. and my family made everyone apple dumplings in the dutch ovens. then, friday night we sat around the fire together and had grandma manwaring tell us her memories of homesteading out here. it's always great to hear how she lived.
saturday morning my family made breakfast for everyone (pancakes, eggs, hash browns). it was quite an undertaking.
then we spent the rest of our time floating the river, hiking, riding bikes/4-wheelers, doing crafts, resting, eating, visiting, driving out to the old homestead, and relaxing. a little of something for everyone. i think everybody had a good time. it was fun to visit with each other about our memories of coming here every year.
wesley
thanks mom and dad for putting together such a great reunion!
