Cousin’s Week is when grandchildren spend the week with us.

Kristen asked me the other day if I know when we started doing this. My oldest pictures are from 2003, so I expect that was the first summer. That means our oldest grandchildren were eleven years younger and some of the youngest ones had not yet been born.

Now the older ones have graduated from high school (two are in college), have jobs, and one is married. They can no longer spend the week here, but several come for Pizza Night (Tuesday) or Hot Dog Roast Night (Friday).

The children arrived on Sunday evening, but the pictures began on Monday, August 18

Ian searching for a project in the Tasty Science book.

These four (our youngest grandchildren) enjoy doing experiments, so I try to have a few science kits on hand for this week.

Diana and Jana (age 16 and 15) also spent the week here, but they have jobs this summer, so part of my week was spent taking them to work – or picking them up after work. There will be pictures of them later.

Ian chose a fizzy drink for his first experiment.

The taste test.

I wish I had gotten a picture of their reactions. It was kind of like, “Yuck!.”

The next experiment – Rockin’ Candy Crystals – was a bit sweeter.

The first part of the project was to tie string on a pencil and place it over a glass – with the string not quite touching the bottom.

After preparing the string they mixed up a sugar mixture.

Then I divided it into four equal parts.

The making of rock candy is a long process. The candy is still in the process of hardening and crystalizing as I write this on September 4 – but it is hardening.

Gloria chose something from the Spa Science box. In this picture they are smelling the essence oils as they decide which one to use. They chose lavender.

In this experiment they were making bath salts.

Jesse used one of these in his bath that night, and determined that his skin was much softer than usual. Plus he smelled of lavender. 🙂

After cleaning up from the experiments – and Diana and Jana got home from work – we went to the church baseball game where an older grandson, Jordan, (#55) was playing.

The blur is him running to home base after a good hit.

Going to the game had a two-fold purpose: to buy hot dogs and drink for the children so I didn’t have to cook supper 🙂 and to watch the final game for this league as these two teams were vying for 1st and 2nd place. Jesse is sitting next to our oldest son, Jeff, (Gloria’s dad) who was also there to enjoy the game.

After Jesse ran to get a ball that went over the fence, Jeff (suspenders) took him to the umpire during an inning change – for a special treat.

In this picture you can see Diana and Jana on the stands behind home plate.

The umpire appreciates when baseballs are returned and keeps Tootsie Rolls in his pocket for the children who bring him balls.

A happy Jesse

In the last picture of the day, Jordan was preparing to hit a ball to the outfield.

We were excited that they won this game – as they were playing against a great team. However, that meant they had to play one more game to determine the winner.

We went home because it was 8:00 PM and time to put the young ones to bed.

When the girls (Diana and Jana) came home, they told us that Gray lost the second game and had to settle for second place.

Second place is not shabby in this league.