What do you get when you get 48 Tillmans together?
I pretty much have the best family ever. Guess where I'm at right now! If you guessed Oregon, you're correct! We're at this place called Sunriver, and it's a pretty sweet resort type place. We have four houses that are great. Also, the high in Oregon is around 80 degrees!! HOORAY!
This is my dad's side of the family, and he's the seventh kid out of eight. Three girls came first (Jean, Anna, and Carrie) and then five boys came after that (Chet, Joe, Steve, Ben [that's my dad!] and Matt). So with all of my grandparents children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren, we have 48 people here at this family reunion. So yeah, it's pretty fabulous.
So my immediate family came in Monday evening, but we were pooped so not much fun happened. Tuesday, I stayed behind with my two youngest siblings and Aunt Carrie and Uncle Greg's son Andrew while the rest of my immediate family, All of Uncle Steve's family, Aunt Carrie and Uncle Greg, and Aunt Sandy went on the Paulina Plunge (a downhill bike ride). Chad (Uncle Chet/Aunt Sandy's son) and I pretty much just stayed around the house watching the kiddos and catching up on our lives.
Wednesday was pretty great. I went on the Paulina Plunge with the rest of the "older kids" because I finally graduated into the older group! It was me, James and his wife Taryn, Alicia and her husband Dustin, Julie, Missy and her husband Phillip, Tiffany, Christine, Chad, and Aunt Sandy led the tour. It was a mostly downhill bike ride, with occasional mini hikes to some water falls that we got to jump in, slide down, and swim in. The water was really cold, but it was totally worth it to jump in and swim around. After we got back and ate dinner, a bunch of us cousins got together (Benjamin, Jacob, Chad, Josh Matt, Malynda, Malia, and Maddy with Kyle, Zach, and Seth watching) and sat in the hot tub for awhile. When we got done with that, we watched Batman Begins and got back to our houses around 2am. I guess there's no curfew with cousins!
Thursday we went to the Lava Caves, and it was pretty neat, and also very cold. We only had a couple of lanterns between the 14 of us that went (my family + Uncle Matt's family), so it was pretty hard to see. Luckily we passed by the rest of our family on the way out and they let us borrow some of their flashlights, which helped out a bunch. The Lava Caves were great because we got to see some pretty neat rock formations. Afterwards I bummed around the house for awhile while my parents and some of the younger kids went on bike ride. After dinner, we went back to Uncle Chet's place to watch The Dark Knight.
Today we went white water rafting! It was my very first time and we had a super cool guide. In my boat there was Matt, Josh, Benjamin, Malia, Chad, Maddy, and some random kid named Cole. It was a class 3 ride (I think out of 5?), and it wasn't too hard at all. Actually, it was perfect for people who had never white water rafted before because there were calm stretches that were super easy. We tried to convince our guide to continue taking us down the river to some class 5 rapids, but apparently that's super dangerous or something along those lines.
Tonight my family and Uncle Matt's family are in charge of dinner. Hello hamburgers and hot dogs! Also, we're going to see The Dark Knight Rises to complete our little tradition of watching Batman movies. I don't even know what we're going to do Saturday night.
I can't believe our reunion is almost over! It's been super crazy fun so far, and hopefully we can keep the ball rolling the next day and a half.
And now, for a little guide of the Tillman family (child of my grandparents first with their spouse second, followed by their children):
Jean/J.D.: Alicia (married Dustin and has three boys- J.J., Cameron, and Sterling), Julie, James (married Taryn and has a little girl Madilyn), and Carrie (she's on her mission right now).
Anna/Mike: Jason (he's married and has two boys now), Jeremy, Shanna (she recently got married this summer), and Doc (he's married too). This whole branch of the family wasn't able to make it out to this reunion which makes us all super sad.
Carrie/Greg: Andrew
Chet/Sandy: Chad, Josh
Joe/Louanne: Brian, Missy (married to Phillip), Tiffany, Brandon, and Christine
Steve/Kathy- Kyle, Zach, and Seth
Ben/Rosa: Me, Benjamin, Jacob, James, Adam, Emily, and Andrew
Matt/Jeselyn: Maddy, Malia, Matt, and Malynda.
Ta da! My super crazy amazing Tillman family!
Thursday we went to the Lava Caves, and it was pretty neat, and also very cold. We only had a couple of lanterns between the 14 of us that went (my family + Uncle Matt's family), so it was pretty hard to see. Luckily we passed by the rest of our family on the way out and they let us borrow some of their flashlights, which helped out a bunch. The Lava Caves were great because we got to see some pretty neat rock formations. Afterwards I bummed around the house for awhile while my parents and some of the younger kids went on bike ride. After dinner, we went back to Uncle Chet's place to watch The Dark Knight.
Today we went white water rafting! It was my very first time and we had a super cool guide. In my boat there was Matt, Josh, Benjamin, Malia, Chad, Maddy, and some random kid named Cole. It was a class 3 ride (I think out of 5?), and it wasn't too hard at all. Actually, it was perfect for people who had never white water rafted before because there were calm stretches that were super easy. We tried to convince our guide to continue taking us down the river to some class 5 rapids, but apparently that's super dangerous or something along those lines.
Tonight my family and Uncle Matt's family are in charge of dinner. Hello hamburgers and hot dogs! Also, we're going to see The Dark Knight Rises to complete our little tradition of watching Batman movies. I don't even know what we're going to do Saturday night.
I can't believe our reunion is almost over! It's been super crazy fun so far, and hopefully we can keep the ball rolling the next day and a half.
And now, for a little guide of the Tillman family (child of my grandparents first with their spouse second, followed by their children):
Jean/J.D.: Alicia (married Dustin and has three boys- J.J., Cameron, and Sterling), Julie, James (married Taryn and has a little girl Madilyn), and Carrie (she's on her mission right now).
Anna/Mike: Jason (he's married and has two boys now), Jeremy, Shanna (she recently got married this summer), and Doc (he's married too). This whole branch of the family wasn't able to make it out to this reunion which makes us all super sad.
Carrie/Greg: Andrew
Chet/Sandy: Chad, Josh
Joe/Louanne: Brian, Missy (married to Phillip), Tiffany, Brandon, and Christine
Steve/Kathy- Kyle, Zach, and Seth
Ben/Rosa: Me, Benjamin, Jacob, James, Adam, Emily, and Andrew
Matt/Jeselyn: Maddy, Malia, Matt, and Malynda.
Ta da! My super crazy amazing Tillman family!
