My Mega Exciting Life: VenableCon 2012

The Venable/Smith/Terry/Mowrer/Deaton/Gilmore Clans convened recently to celebrate VenableCon 2012. Too, too soon... it was over.

The day before we travelled to Ocean Isle, we attended Monty and Kristina's wedding! They tied the knot and we were there to help them celebrate in style. See?

they had a photo booth! i was all over that all night long.

amanda, jenny, the blushing bride, mama, moi and tabby

and if there's mischief to be had, you know i needed to be part of it. here we are decorating their car for the honeymoon trip. amanda, jenny and i ransacked the joint looking for makeshift items to use for decorations. i even roped the children and mama into helping!

one of about twenty self photos of me and jenny pretending to be talking about something shocking. i don't know why. i really don't.

and dancing! my favorite! gross and sweating cutting a rug, but having fun anyway.

Next, BEACH BEACH BEACH! Here are my two favorite shots from the week:

jenny and me jumping joyfully into the pool while lottie sue shrieks on encouragement

me and my mermaid protege, lucy, after a week of swimming lessons earned a pink pool coverup just like mine

But! First things first! Here we have the children in the pool the first night here. I was put in charge of watching the children while the other grown-ups cleaned the kitchen. I had to jump in fully clothed to fish out CJ when I turned my head for TWO SECONDS. Then I cried for 20 minutes because it scared me so bad.

almost everyone was floatie-free by the end of the week, thanks tommy!

Eating is a hallmark of the week. Matt thought he'd wow us with a fancy new cooking technique called SousVide. The SousVide machine is like $500. Instead, we used a cooler full of hot water. And cooked a steak. Sealed in a baggie in hot water. It was a very precise science to say the least.

mattie monitoring the water temp

After a few hours in the hot water bath, it goes on the grill for a flash to get a grilley taste.

waiting for the grill to heat up

on for just a couple of minutes...

and voila. it was eaten up. actually there was one steak and like ten adults so i'll let you do the math on how many bites each person got.

This is how my days usually go: wake up, go for a run. I got a nice little 2.5 mile route carved out the first day and ran it almost everyday. Come back, have breakfast. Put on sunscreen and then it was time for swimming lessons! I was Tommy's assistant.

my mantra was 'don't be scared.' i think i said 'don't be scared' about 500 times a day.

After swimming lessons was time for the beach. An hour or two in the sun and the surf, and it's time for lunch! I usually cooked bacon for BLTs or made lunch for the kids for morning chores. After lunch, pool time! The kids were usually down for naps by then:

i thought lucy was going to die from happiness the afternoon she woke up and both lottie sue and i were napping in bed with her (three humans, one double bed)

When the kids went for naps, we usually played volleyball in the pool!

matt goes in for a dig

After volleyball time, it's time to get cleaned up for supper. We have cocktails, fried appetizers (provided by Dipsey's Fry Kitchen) and get all the food ready for supper. It's quite and extravaganza.

After supper, it's cleanup time, then time to go for a walk on the beach. Once it starts to get dark, we wander back inside. That was my time to kick activity into high gear - Mama and I were in charge of nightly baths for the two little girls. Lord help. Who knew they could get so sandy. We'd bathe them, dry them, get them in nighties, then sit each one down on the bed and tag team pig tail braids for them to sleep in. I was usually right side, Mama left.

After, I would usually have a well-earned dessert, family fellowship and fun until I got sleepy, then go to bed. Rinse and repeat.

And now for the weather. Julia?

here is a storm rolling in one evening

me and my cutie patootie, lucy

i painted all the children's toenails, including max's. he picked out the color(s).

lottie showing me her underwater prowess

and jenny shows off hers

matt made about one million loaves of no-knead bread and taught most every male in attendance how to make your own no-knead bread. share the wealth, yo. make a man a loaf, he eats for a day yadda yadda...

lucy and dipsey one night after supper

sanding up for her nightly challenge for me

one afternoon before supper we had an epic silly string battle with all the children. there were no winners, and no hostages were taken.

that cupcake was super excited about her silly string until it became evident she was not strong enough to push down the button to make the stuff come out. she would point and where/who she wanted squirted and i'd take care of business. silly string is really hard to get out of hair btw. (word to the wise - let it dry completely and then pull out. do NOT try to wash it out. who knew?)

On the 4th of July, we planned a double celebration: the Queen of Ocean Isle's Diamond Jubilee, and Mama's birthday! We had a lovely shrimp boil to kick off the festivities: