A Journal, with Pictures

The fam­i­ly tra­di­tion is to get togeth­er in South Car­oli­na for the fourth of July. This year was par­tic­u­lar­ly inter­est­ing and chal­leng­ing since the fam­i­ly get togeth­er was manda­to­ry and two boards that I serve on have their big annu­al event at the end of the week. Where there is a will there is a way, so on the Fri­day before the fourth we flew from Day­ton to Hilton Head Island and stayed over night in our Hilton Head home. We had din­ner with our friends Gor­don and Mar­i­lyn that evening. The next day we head­ed for our Chechessee cot­tage to join Jen­nifer, Mike and Alexan­dra who trav­eled up from Fort Lauderdale.

Jen­nifer, Mike and Alexan­dra stopped in Savan­nah and picked up Brenn Pra­do our grand­son so he and Alexan­dra could start Camp Spring Island on Sun­day. We had a jol­ly evening Sat­ur­day and the kids were excit­ed to be togeth­er and looked for­ward to the camp. We fell into the rou­tine of Brenn and Alexan­dra going to camp in the morn­ing and all of us meet­ing at the Spring Island pool in the after­noon. It was warm, so the pool was the place to be. Hei­di, Gary, Caitlin and Kin­sey joined us on Tues­day and stayed in a Spring Island cot­tage. On the fourth the fes­tiv­i­ties began with a parade ear­ly after­noon, games for the kids, a great cook­out then Gary took the kids on a cruise in his boat. They checked Bren­n’s crab trap and he had caught sev­en crabs. It was a per­fect fourth of July and every­one was tired by the end of the day. The old­er kids loved Camp Spring Island and were already talk­ing about going again next year.

Every­one had a great fourth and Joyce and I packed and went to bed hap­py par­ents and grand par­ents. Thursday,we had to get up at 5:00 AM for the next leg of the busy week. Hei­di and Gary had to go back to Savan­nah, but returned for Sat­ur­day. Jen, Mike and Alexan­dra stayed until Sun­day so it was a great fam­i­ly week for everyone.