Ewbank Jordan Family Reunion - Fort Wayne, Indiana

 We had the best time at my family reunion in Fort Wayne!

The three of us had an early morning flight on Thursday to Chicago, yawn. We had to park in Economy Parking at Logan because our Sunday night flight got back too late for the Logan Express.

Once we were in Chicago, we hit up this place for a little breakfast, and I love that Todd took this without either of us knowing.

Oh wait, there we go. It was FREEZING in the airport, and Grant didn't bring a hoodie, so he had mine on (but he doesn't fit in the sleeves so this was all he could do).

Natalie landed in Fort Wayne a few hours after we did, so after picking her up, we went out for some dinner at Hall's Tavern near our hotel.

We also went to Kroger to stock up for the weekend. Will it be enough???

When you want cold drinks and you don't have a cooler and the fridge is already full, you just need to come up with other creative ways!

On Friday, we all went to see the gravesite of Johnny Appleseed. Interestingly, he was born in Leominster, Massachusetts!

Johnny Appleseed gradually made his way westward, planting apple trees as he went. He was a bit of a nomad, but he was very kind and was a known conservationist and nurseryman.

He wore a tin pot on his head that he used for cooking, but it doubled as a hat. My kids were thrilled that I made them learn a little history!

His real name was John Chapman. When most people think of Johnny Appleseed, they think of him spreading apple seeds randomly as he traveled westward. In fact, he planted nurseries rather than orchards, built fences around them to protect them from livestock and wildlife, left the nurseries in the care of a local person who sold trees on shares, and came back every couple of years to check on the nursery - and he did this across Pennsylvania, Ohio, Illinois and Indiana - and even up into Ontario. I don't know how he kept track of all of that!

After visiting Johnny Appleseed, we went out to Promenade Park to check out the swings.

Grant enjoyed some shade under this big tree. Eventually, we all joined him when Todd accidentally butt dialed his entire family, so we had a quick chat with them!

We had some time to waste waiting for all of the aunts and uncles and cousins to arrive, so we went and played a couple of rounds of duck pin bowling!

The pins are shaped like fat little ducklings, and the ball is very small, maybe the size of a softball. Afterwards, we played a partial game of indoor corn hole. This place was great for a hot day!

Eventually we went back to the hotel when everyone started arriving. You know it was gonna be that kind of weekend when Uncle Kevin was pushing Natalie around in the luggage cart!

Back in 2013, we had our family reunion here in Fort Wayne over 4th of July weekend, and a few of us went to the Fort Wayne Tin Caps game. So I asked some of my cousins if they wanted to do this again, and everyone said yes! Uncle Kevin called up the Tin Caps and got us a block of tickets - and it was fireworks night at the ballpark! This picture is everything my mother loves most in the world.

Baileys enjoying an evening at the ballpark.

It wasn't a bad evening - we did have some nearby thunderstorms, but it didn't cause any delays. 

I ran into Johnny Appleseed with a tin cap on his head!

You know that one picture from the Academy Awards that Ellen DeGeneres took years ago with all of the famous people in it? This is my family's version of that. Cory, Ann, Jordan, Maggie, Uncle Kevin, Todd and Adam!

It's the 250th birthday of the USA and I wouldn't want to spend it anywhere else than with my family!

Me and Grant, watching the fireworks - this ballpark reminds me of the one I lived at in Augusta, Georgia for a month when I was deployed a couple of years ago. It's got a big apartment building in left field!

The Fort Wayne Tin Caps beat the Great Lakes Loons 8-5 and the fireworks capped off a great evening!

The VERY best part about staying at a Holiday Inn Express is the cinnamon rolls. However, as you can see, no one left any for me!

Aunt Annie set up a bunch of games for the kids on Saturday (and for the adults who still think they are kids, such as myself) and we called it the Ewbank-Olympics!

My fellow Massachusetts cousins, Megan and Josh - and my Chicago cousin Jordan watching the Olympics (I think this was before we roped Jordan into being on our team!)

My mom was wearing Natalie's headband and was in charge of taking pictures of the games with my camera, but someone took her picture instead!

After the games were over, we headed back to the clubhouse where Ryan was doing a little fishing in the pond with Hattie, Kate and Greta.

Cousins all hanging around chatting with Uncle Kevin.

Aunt Annie had dinner catered so the cousins all chipped in and brought cold cuts, bread, cheeses, chips and other lunch time grub!

Of course, we also had some World Cup on!

My mom, her sisters and two of her cousins - Judy from the Jordan side and Adrianne from the Ewbank side! I just love this picture!

Aunt Rhonda, Aunt Annie, Mom, Aunt Sara and Aunt Barbara.  In reverse order! Did they plan this? We'll always be missing Aunt Patti and Uncle John!

Ann, Grant, Cory, Jordan and Andy avoiding the heat.

Y'all. I can't even tell you how happy it made me that Andy made it to the reunion! He's an OBGYN and he was on call at the hospital all night. He managed to get a few winks in and was able to drive over from Chicago to spend the day before he had to go BACK to the hospital! Now that's a loyal Ewbank!

Mom and her sis Aunt Sara - aka: her neighbor and travel partner!

Even though it was hot, Grant and James played a little cornhole.

Ann, Maggie, Barbara, Bill, (and Adam back there!), Thane, Mom and Shannon on the deck of the clubhouse.

Natalie played some cards with Uncle Kevin, Cory and Adam.

The Stearley/Yorke families played some Magic the Gathering!

My mom and my brother read a prayer and a poem for my cousin Mike, who passed away just over a year ago. I didn't get a picture but it was so nice to see his ex-wife (and Cameron's mom) Pam who visited with us.

The kids were keeping bar and making dirty sodas for everyone. Mine was actually quite tasty!

After lunch, Uncle Kevin put together this really cool game where he had a list of things that he was thinking of and we had to guess something in a category which was NOT what he was thinking of. For example: He would say "A country that starts with the letter G." And you'd have to assume he was going to pick Germany because that's pretty obvious, so you might say "Gabon" or "Ghana." The person who picked the actual thing he was thinking of was eliminated. 

Oh and we had some cake, too! Who took that one middle piece?!?

I just called this the elimination game! Cory is very serious here. 

Round one -- it was down to Cory and James -- and Cory won!

Round two was down to Greta and Grant - and Grant won! This is not surprising, given that many of the questions were geography or history based and that is Grant's jam!

Swales kids are smart, what can we say.

The winners of rounds 1 and 2 with their coveted plastic gold trophies!

We can't forget the winning team of the Ewbank Olympics!!! Aunt Rhonda, Kate and Greta display their hardware, although Greta is like, "Wait, this isn't real gold!?!"

Ok folks, here we go, round 3!

I had to snap a quick picture with my Massachusetts cousin Shannon! 

So who won round 3? Natalie, of course!

The big winners!

Proud of their golden trophies! Later, we would find Cory drinking out of his! I'm sure that's fiiiiine...

But now... WE SING! Brie and Hattie got our karaoke evening kicked off with a little Taylor Swift!

Jordan did an INCREDIBLE rendition of Sherry, Baby!

And Uncle Kevin serenaded us too! Meanwhile, DJ-JJ was taking requests.

Nat and I getting passionate about singing Natasha Bedingfield's Unwritten. I remember one time when I was pregnant with her and driving on Route 50 down in Arlington, Virginia where we lived when this song came on the radio and I could hardly hold back my tears as her story was completely unwritten at that time. Now look at this beautiful baby all grown up! 

We were so into it ha ha.

And so were Stasi and Maggie, who were jumping around during our song! We should have made them our backup dancers!

Karaoke wouldn't be the same if my brother (assisted by Hattie) didn't sing Just a Gigolo - it's always a big hit!

Natalie and Aunt Rhonda performed a duet, singing Wagon Wheel!

Natalie, Hattie, Kate and Greta also sang Taylor Swift's The Life of a Showgirl!

They signed Grant up to sing, but he didn't really want to sing, so Natalie didn't make him sing alone. He and Natalie belted out Yellow Submarine by the Beatles!

This was one of my favorite pictures of the night. I needed a cookie and Dan needed... celery?

At the end of the night, we all helped Aunt Annie and Uncle Kevin clean up the clubhouse before heading back to the hotel.

In the morning, most of us gathered for breakfast. We were missing a few cousins but managed to take a few cute photos before most of the crew hopped in their cars and drove home.

Some of us had to fly home though, so the airplane crowd went to get some lunch!

Todd took a cute picture of our babies 💕

After lunch, it was off to the airport where we all flew to Chicago before separating once again. Natalie went back to Missouri, and the rest of us went back to Boston.

Until next time, fam! We love you!