Homesick at home

We had the best week ever with our friends here.  We had old friends and new friends.  We had 35 people and 15 kids.  It was a week full of laughter, good belly aching laughter, liquor and inside jokes.  18 of us stayed in this house for a week and we all got along without a hiccup.

The chaos that existed in this house earned the nick name of  the frat house.  In all honesty, it was like Animal House.  We had dishes in the flower pots out front, underwear in the driveway, a horse trough of water for water guns in the driveway, a broken window from a wayward baseball, red solo cups freaking everywhere, a recycling can full of liquor bottles, little boys peeing off the deck, a 24 pack of toilet paper by the front door.....that's a mystery to me....and a stampede thru the front yard of a herd of cows and last but not least, two emergency room visits.

The enclosed sun room/porch became the Renegade Lounge.  It's where we did the best story telling, drinking and laughing.  We laughed to the point that we kept the 12 children awake who pointed out that they couldn't sleep because of our loud laughter.  As a collective group, we told stories that are now legendary.  After all of our stories and laughter, we reached the unanimous conclusion that we are the normal families!  All of us passed extensive and thorough backgrounds to be given the privilege to parent our children through adoption.  We also realized we might just all be going straight to hell because of our humor.

Hell or not, I'll enjoy my company there.  Our friends are our family, the ones who will raise our children should we die, and I couldn't imagine them being raised by any other families more like us than the Watkins and Dorcheus's.  To all of our Renegade families, we anxiously await next year to see you all again and to share more fun and love.  We love you all and can't wait for next summer and a repeat of the intense fun.

Stories of adventures to follow. Stay tuned.

Let the fun begin

Simply put, tomorrow our dear friends invade, um, er, I mean come to visit for a week or so.  All of us Laurie's are so excited that we feel like kid's on Christmas Eve.  I'm busy cleaning the house, the barn and the arena so the kids have places to play and get into trouble.  Today I'll get the laundry done and try to keep the house tidy until they arrive.  After that, I have no expectations.

The volleyball net is up. Madison and her boyfriend Tyler, Thomas and Richnigthder played a quick game last night at 9PM and ended quickly when Madison clothes-lined herself on Tyler's outstretched arm.  It was freakin' hilarious.  The soccer cones are set up for the Haitian sensations and I bought a bucket of baseballs for the kids to hit around......Way far away from the house for the window's sake....picked up some Frisbees and some nerf balls.  Buying all this stuff almost guarantees that not a single ball will be played with.  They'll most likely be running thru the dark and mysterious woods looking for dead things and collecting ticks all over their bodies.

I've got so much to do and yet I sit here with great anticipation about the fun and chaos just ahead.  We are so grateful to have such wonderful friends and to be able to meet up with some regularity.  It was just 11 months ago when we attempted our trip to Flathead Lake only to end up stranded in Butte, Montana.  Little did we know a family legend was born of that Griswold vacation.  Ever since that trip, for some odd reason, our kids think that it's normal for family vacations to visit historic brothels.  Where do my weird kids get such messed up ideas?