"Graduation" Party

As fate would have it, Geoff (my sister's husband) graduated from his medical residency on the same night as Greg was ordained! They have been leading these strange parallel lives since they graduated from Westmont in 1996. After several years of both of them working in Santa Barbara Geoff went to Israel for medical school (3 years) and Greg went to Chicago for Seminary (3 years). Then Geoff has been doing his medical residency in Olympia, WA and Greg did his Chaplain residency here in Boise. Their "graduations" were on the same night, at the same time and at the same hotel chain - only in different cities. I am hoping that we can make our parallel lives intersect at some point!

So since we couldn't go to each others' ceremonies, we had a big family get-together/party the next day in Olympia at Bur Foot park.

The graduates.

We had a great picnic (with WAY too much food), complete with roasted marshmallows! Thank's Del for being the grill master!

The kids all had a blast playing together...

(love this one of the oldest and youngest of the cousins-not counting Dean, who wasn't there)

Adventuresome Aliya

(Thanks Auntie Beka for my new dino-lizard!)

Sisters...

After the BBQ, some had to head back to Portland, and the rest of us took a little hike out to the beach (the sound) to look at the water.
Love this family picture!
Sisters (yes, I have a handful of rocks and beach glass!)
There always has to be a competition...Geoff won this rock throwing contest hands down...I attribute that to the fact that his arms are A LOT longer than Greg's! :)

It's in our genes - the rock collecting.

Thank you to all who came from near and far to celebrate these milestones in our family!