Wood-Ingleson

Angie said on the drive home, "This was Layla's first family reunion and it wasn't even her own." This past weekend, for the second year in a row, we crashed the Ingleson family reunion in Roscommon. The Ingleson family is Justin Rumbach's mom Susie's family who are from Michigan. This family is something, their gatherings are like nothing else and just a great time. Their reunions set the bar, complete with water games in the pool, horseshoe tournament, camping and to top it all off an annual Fourth of July parade that you wouldn't believe unless you witnessed it. A couple more years of this and we are going to have to start hyphenating our name.


This is Justin's Aunt Sara and cousin Harry after the parade.


Justin's daughter Hadley tries on her hat before the parade.


To put it mildly we will just say that the Rumbach family dressed as farm hands. I am not sure how, but Cameron slept throught the parade. She is wearing a shirt and overhauls that Justin wore when he was little.


What reunion would be complete without a dog and a plastic mower.


Layla was a good girl. You don't see Ella because we dropped her off at the lake to spend time with Jim and Lou. Good thing too, it was a long day.


Just after 11:30 a.m., Layla and Angie get ready for a swim in the pool at the farm. We never did run into pickpockets or loose women, just some really nice folks. Well I guess that is not entirely true ... the clock must not have been working ... we arrived around 2 p.m.

Rumbach's are in town

Good thing we have a friend that is a professional photographer. (No offense to all our other friends that are photographers :) Abbie wanted to shoot Cameron's six-month portrait so I sweet-talked Justin into shooting the Wood kids too. Don't worry we will distribute prints.

Property: excavating and pond

Jim, Adam and Henry met us at the property to take a look at what our excavator had gotten done over the weekend. We are just waiting on the building permit to start. Hopefully in the next few weeks everything will be in full swing, electric will get run and the foundation will be started.

Nana's Girls

Here is the first installment of images from the Fourth of July week off and vacationing. This past weekend we spent the weekend at the lake enjoying the nice weather and the Rogers. (That is what Ella calls Nana and Papa Wood).


Layla snuggles with Nana after a bath in the kitchen sink.


Ella and Nana watch the neighbors kids on the trampoline next door. She came up from the lake with a new word in her vocabulary Tram-po-line.

Layla's Baptism

Layla was baptized on Sunday, my sister Ashley and Angie's brother Adam are her Godparents. She did very well, just chilling out in Daddy's arms, looking all around the church. Thanks to everyone who made her day special.

Summer Stroll

Ella, Angie, Layla, Grandma Bishop, Nana Bonnie, Aunt Lisa and I went to the Summer Solstice stroll in downtown Midland last week.


Ella is still talking about the "dancing people" she really had a great time, I think everyone did.


The group is called Strange Fruit, they are from Austrailia and were part of the Matrix:Midland event. They danced and performed at the top of 14-foot fiberglass poles.


On the way back to the car Ella would arch her back and sway back and forth pretending to be like the group. Aunt Lisa helped her out being her fiberglass pole.

On the island

This is Layla's first time in an outdoor swing. She thought it was pretty cool, but not as cool as Ella thought it was to have a swing partner.



Grammy and Ella enjoyed a cool dip in the lake. Ella calls it the pool, but the colder water doesn't seem to bother her.

You are my sunshine

Look who figured out that pictures actually move. Check out this video of Ella singing along to one of her favorite songs.

Wagon tails

I didn't think Annie would stay in the wagon. Really I picked her up and placed her in the wagon thinking all fours wouldn't even get the chance to hit the bottom. She proved me wrong, she curled up next to Ella and rode around the yard. Even through Ella's hugs and kisses she stayed patient.

(not) All Smiles

Here is a photo from a week or so ago. Our baby sitter said that Layla didn't eat much today because she was to busy smiling. I guess she was smiling through her bottle. Thats funny, she was crying through her bottle later in the evening.

Dragonfly Friend

Ella had a visitor while swinging with Angie today. A dragonfly hung out, cleaned it's legs, showed off it's transparent wings and green eyes to a very curious little girl. I was so proud of Angie, she actually touched it. It hung around for 10 or 15 minutes and then flew off.

Slim Shady

I was out mowing the back field today and came across these fine shades. Pretty sure I know who they belong to, I think her name rhymes with Lamy Groper. Anyway, if anyone is missing a pair of sunglasses from the bon fire at my place let me know. Until then watch out around town for a slim guy riding around in his hoopty tahoe sporting these hot shades.

Stothard 9

Here are the nine Stothard kids. The four humans, from left, my neices Ali, Carley and nephews Shane and Nathan. I'm not sure if the goats have names yet. I know they were thinking of naming one of them pokey, or dot or dotty or something because it seriously has white circles all over it's body. Leasle gave birth to triplets and Grettle gave birth to twins. Count 'em up folks 4 + 5 = 9.



Layla started smiling the past couple of weeks. Most of the smiles come out for mommy or the papa but occassionally everyone else can sneak one out of her.

Dirty Birds

For two weeks during my hunting season no turkeys could be found. Since my season finished these dirty birds have been taunting me every evening and morning. They wake me up from their roost every morning and put me to bed every night with their gobbling. This morning it wasn't the turkeys that woke me up, it was Annie. Growling from the porch, she wasn't too sure what to make of them. This tom strutted cirlces around this hen all the down to the deadend, over our neighbor's bridge and up his driveway.

Tasty morsels

Do you think that is where the word morel came from? Take away tasty and an 's' and you get morels. These morels were found in our honey hole last weekend. I found four mushrooms with the biggest one four inches long. They were tasty, just ask Kevin, Brett and Tyler. I went out looking for more today. I'm not sure if the season is done or if our honey hole has just dried up. I found one dry morel. Can the season be done already, how sad.

Farwell JJ

We sent our winter intern, Jason Johns away with a blazin' party. It was great working with you JJ. Have a great time in Boston and hopefully our paths will cross in the future, you made the long winter fly by. When you get to Boston look up that C. Johnson fellow, I hear he will have some free time on his hands.

Stothard Softball

The pink ladies from the O'Laughlin (funeral home) softball team battled the Westown girls this past week. The team motto is "knock 'em dead" fitting because during "coach pitch" softball the teams pretty much bat around the lineup. Lets just say there are more hits then there are outs most innings.


My niece, Ali warms up in the on deck circle.


"Keep your eye on the ball," her mother/coach kept encouraging. Just for the record, she did.


Ali hustles down to third base.


My niece Carley, practices catching ground balls before the game.


The ball ran into Carley's bat a couple times.


After playing in the dirt as second, Carley gets a late start to third base.


What form, what grace ...



You can pick your teamates, your can pick your nose, but you can't pick your teamates noses (Is that how it goes).


When Nathan gets old enough the Stothards would have enough players to round out the infield.


Ah yes ... the best thing about playing organized softball, snack time.

Thunder Rolls

While leaving Bay City tonight the clouds gave us a show. These images were taken near the I-75 overpass on Salzburg Rd. By the time we drove to Midland the sun started glowing yellow though the clouds and by the time we were home there was a rainbow in the sky. It actually looked worse than it was.

Sleep Baby, Sleep

Last week Angie was excited because Layla was sleeping in four-hour chunks of time. Tonight she was excited because she slept in a six-hour chunk. Pretty soon she will be sleeping the whole night. (Again, Photo by Angie, I am thinking about hanging up the camera and just letting her do it).

Tweeners and Snapshots

In honor of Brett's new blog I thought I would look deep (last summer) into the archives to pull out a picture that would honor the occassion. I don't think the picture needs any explaination, so here's to you and your new blog buddy! Anyone interested in checking out Tweeners and Snapshots check out Brett's link on the right.