Pow-Wow Weekend!

This past weekend we went home to Virginia for the Chickahominy Tribe's annual Pow-wow. It's been an almost annual tradition for me and Randy since we went there on our first date together 11 years ago. It's important enough to me and Randy that our family continues to participate in tribal events that we loaded up the mini-van with three kids (for the first trip since the third kid was born) and headed down to VA for a whirl-wind weekend.

We went down to Aunt N and Uncle A's house in northern VA the first night and had a family pizza party. It's impossible not to love hanging out with my sisters and parents and we partied late into the evening. (I even had a beer!) The kids love Aunt N's especially because she has two German Shepherd dogs that they adore. (I cannot say that their affection is requited, but the kids don't mind.) They also enjoyed sitting in the puppy's cage:

My Caged Beasts

Early the next morning, we headed down to central VA to visit Grandma, Grandpa, and Uncle D before the Pow-wow. We got some lunch from the deli up the road. (I still cannot believe that our hometown now has so many tasty places at which to eat lunch.) Grandma gave the kids an alphabet toy and they were happy as clams. Then we headed to the Pow-wow.

The day was a little damp, but the event coordinators had laid straw down to keep mud at a minimum. We proceeded to bump into family and friends left and right. G was of course at her happiest when we found her cousin R. The girls stuck together like glue for about a half hour before R had to leave. G, S, and R spent their time dancing to the drummers and holding hands. It was way cute.

So Happy to See Each Other!

Baby C was fussy and had a cold and had not nursed well all day, so we left the Pow-wow and headed to the grocery store to buy some infant pain reliever (and some really cool juice boxes for the kids, which were a great diversion) and then went back to Grandma's house for some more visiting.

After Grandma's house, we crashed one of my best friends of all time's house and shoved some food at the kids for dinner. The kids had been dragged around all day, but since my friend has two kids of her own almost exactly the same ages as G and S, they immediately started playing and quickly forgot all the car rides.

From there we headed back to Aunt N's, threw the kids in pjs, brushed their teeth, and they passed out quickly. My other childhood best friend and her husband came over to visit. We had a wonderful time catching up and she brought me some awesome hand-me-downs and some of her gorgeous home-made jewelry. (What's not to love about that?!)

The next day we said goodbye to Aunt N and Uncle A and headed over to Nana's and Grandpa's for the afternoon. Nana has a great stash of toys and the kids ran right into their house and proceeded to cover their pristine living room with toys in less than 5 minutes. We had a great visit, ate some dinner, and then got back on the road to head to PA. We got home around 9:30 and once again threw the kids in pjs and got them to bed as quickly as possible.

We had a great trip and other than being a little filthy (we skipped a few baths due to late nights) and tired (no one slept in, in spite of the late bedtimes), Randy and I are calling this first trip as a family of five a success! :)