Our Awesome Pilot

We flew from SFO to SLC on Wednesday, slept over at my parents house one more night, & then left early early on Thursday morning to head home to Germany.  Saying good-bye to Cadence just about did me in.  It was SO hard.  I love that girl with every fiber of my being.  I'm SO excited for her adventures at BYU & can't wait to see what she'll accomplish.  Our family will miss her, but she's going to do great things.

One thing that made the flight home awesome was our amazing pilot from SLC to Chicago.  We realized half way through our family reunion that Talon was the scheduled pilot for our flight to Chicago.  It was GREAT.  Our flight was delayed 40 minutes, but our awesome pilot flew extra fast to make sure we made our connection to Germany.

Talon let the kids see the cockpit of the plane while we waited to take off.  It was SUPER fun.

I love these two brothers.  Such a neat experience.

 Because of our flight delay, we almost missed our flight from Chicago to Germany.  They were announcing our names over the loud speaker at the airport threatening to close the gate.  We literally sprinted over a mile through the Chicago airport to make it to our gate.  It was like the scene in Home Alone.  At the time it wasn't funny, but now that it's over, we must have looked hilarious.

We made it safe & sound & made it home to Germany.

It was a wonderful vacation & the perfect end of summer.

Potter Family Photos 2021

Before the reunion ended we took some family photos to remember our fun time together.

I love Trek's family so much.  These pictures make me smile.  I miss them so much.  I'm so glad we got to be together for 3 whole days.

 

Potter Family Reunion 2021 - Last Day Fun

Wednesday morning, everybody started leaving, including us.  We had some family pictures taken & then everybody started on their way home.

Canyon got a few more minutes on Tylee's piano before we left.  Oh how I'd love to have a grand in my house someday.  This piano was GORGEOUS.

Then we set out our family reunion snake in Tylee's yard.

On our way to the airport we stopped at a mall & let the kids play together one last time before flying back to UT.

And we enjoyed our last lunch together at the Cheesecake Factory.

I was sad it was over, but it was the best reunion EVER.  I love my family.

 

Potter Family Reunion 2021 - Fun Park Adventures

On Tuesday, we started our morning at the crack of dawn to get Lorien her driver's permit from the CA DMV.  Let me tell you, this was MONTHS in the making.  Driver's Ed online, studying for the test, forms, addresses, trying to figure out what state we could claim for her, etc.  But it finally worked out & she now has her learners permit.  We're going to teach her how to drive & then fly her home in the spring to get her actual license.  THEN, she'll be able to take the German driving test to get her license out here for her Senior year.  Yay.

We started our morning with surprises from Tylee.  She bought each of the kids a towel with their name on it, a personalized water bottle, & a canvas bag with their names on them.  For the adults she got towels that said "Potter" on them.  SO FUN.

On our way to the jump park, we realized that Trek is pretty much his dad.

The first thing we did was play at a jump park.  We spent a full hour jumping around, doing flips, & playing basketball.  The kids were in heaven.

After jumping, we explored the HUGE arcade they had next to the jump park.  The kids each got some tokens & played for another hour.  It was fun watching them team up together to beat certain games.

We ate some lunch & then played an epic game of laser tag.  Lucas totally killed us with Lorien in 2nd place & me in 3rd.  Laser tag is one of my favorite games so I loved that.

After playing at this park, we drove to another one down the road that had go-karts & bumper boats.  Tylee met us there after work & we had a blast driving & getting wet.

Bladen was my driver.  The first lap, I almost stopped the car & swapped places with him because he didn't know how to push the pedal & steer at the same time, but then it literally just clicked for him & he was AMAZING.  We were speeding around the track & he was mastering the steering better than some teenagers I know.  I was impressed.

But the highlight of the entire day was the bumper boats.  We thought they were little boats that worked like bumper cars, until one of the kids found a button that made a water gun spray water at the other boats.  As soon as that was discovered, the bumper boat experience turned into an all out water war between cousins & siblings.  This was the absolute funniest thing I've ever seen in my life.  They were RUTHLESS.

They were SOAKED.

The park also had a fun drop tower that we all rode to finish off our day of park adventures.

Once we got home, we all got into our swimsuits since we were already soaked & swam in the pool for the rest of the night.  We had yummy BBQ catered for dinner & life was FANTASTIC.