Holly and family come for a visit

My sister Holly came for a visit with her kids, son-in-law and grandson this past week. We don't get family visitors often so Madison and Sloane also came down to be here. We had a great time. Unfortunately this was a very warm week in Albuquerque with pretty high humidity so the evaporative coolers (Swamp Coolers) were not working well. We attempted to counter that by buying some floor fans which did help a bit.

We ate great, played tennis and in general had a good time. One of the highlights was having a watermelon seed spitting contest (using certified "Blessed by Jesus" watermelons and all the girls going for manicures. We made carmel popcorn (using Nan Cattle's marshmallow recipe) and had a good time eating it under the willow tree in the backyard. Holly learned to play Mexican Train dominos and we spent one evening playing Scum, which everyone enjoyed. Grand baby Rider entertained everyone with his cute smile and disposition. My family got to know his Dad, Brad, better and we all agreed that Ashley did a great job bringing him into the family.

Friday was Tennis day and started at 8 AM. I think we got over half of the 10 people in the house on the court that day and everyone had a good time. Holly and I finished up around 4 pm but we all rotated around. The highlight for me was watching Madison and Courtney play a pretty competive match. Mostly it was just fun watching them enjoy the game.

One of the best things about their visit was that we could all bunk up in our home with most people having beds (greatful for Madison and Sloane being willing to sleep on couches). Having everyone together just made it that much more enjoyable.

We all went to church together on Sunday and it was a great surprise to have my sister and three of her daughters along with Sloane attend the youth class I teach every fourth Sunday. They all made some good comments and the class went well.

Sunday evening, after they left, we sat around talking about how nice it is to be with family and how nice of them it was to come for a visit. We will need to make a trip to Las Vegas to spend more time with them before February.