The best family reunion EVER!
"Oh, but anyway, Toto, we're home. Home! And this is my room, and you're all here. And I'm not gonna leave here ever, ever again, because I love you all, and oh - Auntie Em - there's no place like home!"
-Judy Garland as Dorothy Gale
ending lines of "The Wizard of Oz"
Oh, what a great movie and well, those lines sum up my trip to Dorothy's home, Kansas, quite well! I did have a great time - and a wonderful trip - but when it comes down to it, there's no place like home!
So, I went to Kansas for the Cooper Family Reunion, which is always a good time. It cracks me up that year after year, we can get together and tell the same stories, and they're STILL entertaining!! :) I guess for the sake of making this as easy as I possibly can, and we all know that I am lazy, I'll give you all a day by day recap of my fabulous trip!!
Thursday: Our flight didn't leave from Eugene until 2:00 p.m., so the morning should have been relaxed. However, at 6 a.m., some people thought playing in the dumpster would be a great idea. For those of you who don't know my apartment...the dumpster outside, sits against my living room and bedroom walls. So, the banging of the dumpster lid at 6 a.m. was not a welcome sound! :P I got up and did some stuff, then I was tired, so I laid back down and slept a littl more, then got up again and got ready for Kansas. My brother, Brian, got to my place around noon, and we headed to the airport. Got ourselves all checked in and x-rayed for who knows what, grabbed some beverages (beer for him, iced coffee for me) at the airport restaurant, and then got on our plane!
We had a 1 1/2 hour layover in Denver, where I looked at some fun buffalo souveniers, we ate some food and proceeded to ALMOST miss our flight to Wichita. We didn't though and off we headed to the Sunflower State!
Our flight landed in Wichita about 9:00 p.m. and our ma & pa were there to pick us up, as they'd flown into Kansas City and drove down, a couple days earlier. We got our bags and headed toward Mulvane, where we were staying the night with my cousins, Susan, Clark & Whitney. WE made one stop at Sonic for some rootbeer floats on the way. YUM! Then when we got to their house, we stayed up late, talking, watching a video of the tornado that came within 1/8 mile of t heir house last year and just catching up!
Friday: Whitney and I were woken up by the glorious smell of bacon, about 9:00. So we got up, all excited for bacon, only to find that our parents had eaten all of it! How dare they! We cooked some more, plus some Eggo Waffles and us some breakfast! We messed around the house all morning and about 2:00 packed up the cars and headed toward the thriving metropolis of Sterling, Kansas - population 2500. Our family reunion was being held at Sterling College. Fittingly enough there is a Cooper Hall there - as well as the main st. through the campus is Cooper St. Go figure! It turned out to be a pretty nice place, but at first we were a little surprised at just how ghettolicious the dorms were!!
That night after dinner, a bunch of us loaded into cars and went for a little tour of Sterling. Since this is the town our family lived in 40+ years ago, we saw houses were everyone lived.
And where Grandpa Cooper's seed store was and stuff like that.
Later on a group of us went into Hutch (Hutchinson a "big" town about 25 miles away) for a Wal*Mart and Sonic run. That night I was up til about 3:30 a.m. cuz I wasn't tired. My brother and I explored the Sterling College campus in the middle of the night!
Saturday: Even though I had been up super late the night before, I got up in time for breakfast at 8 a.m. After we ate, we all just kinda hung around and visited, something our family is VERY good at! That afternoon, Brian, Whitney, Aimee, Justin, Wendy, Kevin and I headed toward Nickerson (about 10 miles away) to go to Hedrick's Exotic Animal Farm. (http://www.hedricks.com) We went expecting to see depressed anima.s, but ended up having the greatest adventure EVER!! We played with giraffes...
camels...
goats & calves...
kangaroos...
and BISON!!!!
It was GREAT!!!!!!
After our fabulous adventure at Hedrick's we headed back to the SC (Sterling College) where some cousins (the Griffins) of ours, were there to tell us about some family history/geneology stuff. I don't really remember most of what they told us, except my family apparently liked to walk. And some ancestors of mine walked from Missouri to California, twice!! CRAZY!!
The Griffins told my dad about this street dance that was going on that night in Nickerson, and they invited us "kids" to come into town for it. Brian, Aimee, Whitney and I decided, oh what the heck, so we went. It turned out to be the craziest, most fun night, that made this reunion the best reunion ever! :)
We got there, and were like ok this is boring, then we ran into one of our Griffin cousins...well his name is Dale Sturgis actually. He's like my dad's age. This cool old guy. LOL He told us where we could buy some beer, so we walked down to the gas station and got some beer. That made us happier. When we got back our other Griffin cousins (also about my dad's age) were there too. We all had some beers together, and danced and just had fun hanging out. Then Dale was like "Hey why don't we all go into Hutch to the Polo Club and have another beer" - when the dance was over. So that's what we ended up doing. We hung out with this dude, who we'd just met that day, but apparently we're related to. It was crazy! We got back to the SC about 1:15 a.m. - and took the rest of our beers to the football stadium and drank them and hung out. Again went to bed around 3:30 a.m.!
Sunday: Up again for breakfast at 8:00 - and then Whitney and I decided we'd had SO much fun at the exotic animal farm the day before, that we would go back again! This time we went with my older sibs and my nieces, so that was fun!
AND...this time I GOT KISSED BY A GIRAFFE!!!!!!!! It was AWESOME!!!! We got back to the SC, showered and got dressed and stuff, in time to sit and visit some more. Then we had lunch, where we surprised Whitney with a birthday cake (it was her 20th birthday) and then we did the whole group photos thing.
After that people started heading their separate directions, some people had to head to the airport or home and stuff. Brian & Whitney, went on back to Wichita, to see a movie with some friends of hers for her birthday. I stayed in Sterling, and went swimming with my sister & my nieces. We had dinner at the college, and then everyone decided to go visit the cemetary where Grandma & Grandpa Cooper are buried. It was kind of our last "official" thing as a reunion.
We spent a little while there, I tried to recreate a picture that was taken of me at age 4, 8 and 13, jumping off a memorial "flying" as I called it when I was for. However, I fall to the ground a little faster now then I did then, so the picture didn't really work out. Then Tracey, Anya & I headed back to Wichita, to meet up with Brian & Whitney, and check into our hotel for the night. It was an adventure to get into the parking lot, but we made it. Made one last Sonic run - and then got a good night's sleep. We got up early the next morning to head to the airport and all flew home! We were on the same fight to Denver, and then they headed to Seattle and us to Eugene.
Here's my last picture that I took in Kansas...
I think its kinda fitting!! It was a GORGEOUS sunset.
So there you have it, my trip to Kansas, in words and pictures! WOW that was long!!! LOL I'm back to work and all that now, and just trying to get myself going, I'm pretty tired. But doing alright, still not sure what's ahead with my job. :P Maybe, I'll move to Kansas!!!!
-Judy Garland as Dorothy Gale
ending lines of "The Wizard of Oz"
Oh, what a great movie and well, those lines sum up my trip to Dorothy's home, Kansas, quite well! I did have a great time - and a wonderful trip - but when it comes down to it, there's no place like home!
So, I went to Kansas for the Cooper Family Reunion, which is always a good time. It cracks me up that year after year, we can get together and tell the same stories, and they're STILL entertaining!! :) I guess for the sake of making this as easy as I possibly can, and we all know that I am lazy, I'll give you all a day by day recap of my fabulous trip!!
Thursday: Our flight didn't leave from Eugene until 2:00 p.m., so the morning should have been relaxed. However, at 6 a.m., some people thought playing in the dumpster would be a great idea. For those of you who don't know my apartment...the dumpster outside, sits against my living room and bedroom walls. So, the banging of the dumpster lid at 6 a.m. was not a welcome sound! :P I got up and did some stuff, then I was tired, so I laid back down and slept a littl more, then got up again and got ready for Kansas. My brother, Brian, got to my place around noon, and we headed to the airport. Got ourselves all checked in and x-rayed for who knows what, grabbed some beverages (beer for him, iced coffee for me) at the airport restaurant, and then got on our plane!
We had a 1 1/2 hour layover in Denver, where I looked at some fun buffalo souveniers, we ate some food and proceeded to ALMOST miss our flight to Wichita. We didn't though and off we headed to the Sunflower State!
Our flight landed in Wichita about 9:00 p.m. and our ma & pa were there to pick us up, as they'd flown into Kansas City and drove down, a couple days earlier. We got our bags and headed toward Mulvane, where we were staying the night with my cousins, Susan, Clark & Whitney. WE made one stop at Sonic for some rootbeer floats on the way. YUM! Then when we got to their house, we stayed up late, talking, watching a video of the tornado that came within 1/8 mile of t heir house last year and just catching up!
Friday: Whitney and I were woken up by the glorious smell of bacon, about 9:00. So we got up, all excited for bacon, only to find that our parents had eaten all of it! How dare they! We cooked some more, plus some Eggo Waffles and us some breakfast! We messed around the house all morning and about 2:00 packed up the cars and headed toward the thriving metropolis of Sterling, Kansas - population 2500. Our family reunion was being held at Sterling College. Fittingly enough there is a Cooper Hall there - as well as the main st. through the campus is Cooper St. Go figure! It turned out to be a pretty nice place, but at first we were a little surprised at just how ghettolicious the dorms were!!
That night after dinner, a bunch of us loaded into cars and went for a little tour of Sterling. Since this is the town our family lived in 40+ years ago, we saw houses were everyone lived.
And where Grandpa Cooper's seed store was and stuff like that.
Later on a group of us went into Hutch (Hutchinson a "big" town about 25 miles away) for a Wal*Mart and Sonic run. That night I was up til about 3:30 a.m. cuz I wasn't tired. My brother and I explored the Sterling College campus in the middle of the night!
Saturday: Even though I had been up super late the night before, I got up in time for breakfast at 8 a.m. After we ate, we all just kinda hung around and visited, something our family is VERY good at! That afternoon, Brian, Whitney, Aimee, Justin, Wendy, Kevin and I headed toward Nickerson (about 10 miles away) to go to Hedrick's Exotic Animal Farm. (http://www.hedricks.com) We went expecting to see depressed anima.s, but ended up having the greatest adventure EVER!! We played with giraffes...
camels...
goats & calves...
kangaroos...
and BISON!!!!
It was GREAT!!!!!!
After our fabulous adventure at Hedrick's we headed back to the SC (Sterling College) where some cousins (the Griffins) of ours, were there to tell us about some family history/geneology stuff. I don't really remember most of what they told us, except my family apparently liked to walk. And some ancestors of mine walked from Missouri to California, twice!! CRAZY!!
The Griffins told my dad about this street dance that was going on that night in Nickerson, and they invited us "kids" to come into town for it. Brian, Aimee, Whitney and I decided, oh what the heck, so we went. It turned out to be the craziest, most fun night, that made this reunion the best reunion ever! :)
We got there, and were like ok this is boring, then we ran into one of our Griffin cousins...well his name is Dale Sturgis actually. He's like my dad's age. This cool old guy. LOL He told us where we could buy some beer, so we walked down to the gas station and got some beer. That made us happier. When we got back our other Griffin cousins (also about my dad's age) were there too. We all had some beers together, and danced and just had fun hanging out. Then Dale was like "Hey why don't we all go into Hutch to the Polo Club and have another beer" - when the dance was over. So that's what we ended up doing. We hung out with this dude, who we'd just met that day, but apparently we're related to. It was crazy! We got back to the SC about 1:15 a.m. - and took the rest of our beers to the football stadium and drank them and hung out. Again went to bed around 3:30 a.m.!
Sunday: Up again for breakfast at 8:00 - and then Whitney and I decided we'd had SO much fun at the exotic animal farm the day before, that we would go back again! This time we went with my older sibs and my nieces, so that was fun!
AND...this time I GOT KISSED BY A GIRAFFE!!!!!!!! It was AWESOME!!!! We got back to the SC, showered and got dressed and stuff, in time to sit and visit some more. Then we had lunch, where we surprised Whitney with a birthday cake (it was her 20th birthday) and then we did the whole group photos thing.
After that people started heading their separate directions, some people had to head to the airport or home and stuff. Brian & Whitney, went on back to Wichita, to see a movie with some friends of hers for her birthday. I stayed in Sterling, and went swimming with my sister & my nieces. We had dinner at the college, and then everyone decided to go visit the cemetary where Grandma & Grandpa Cooper are buried. It was kind of our last "official" thing as a reunion.
We spent a little while there, I tried to recreate a picture that was taken of me at age 4, 8 and 13, jumping off a memorial "flying" as I called it when I was for. However, I fall to the ground a little faster now then I did then, so the picture didn't really work out. Then Tracey, Anya & I headed back to Wichita, to meet up with Brian & Whitney, and check into our hotel for the night. It was an adventure to get into the parking lot, but we made it. Made one last Sonic run - and then got a good night's sleep. We got up early the next morning to head to the airport and all flew home! We were on the same fight to Denver, and then they headed to Seattle and us to Eugene.
Here's my last picture that I took in Kansas...
I think its kinda fitting!! It was a GORGEOUS sunset.
So there you have it, my trip to Kansas, in words and pictures! WOW that was long!!! LOL I'm back to work and all that now, and just trying to get myself going, I'm pretty tired. But doing alright, still not sure what's ahead with my job. :P Maybe, I'll move to Kansas!!!!