Ah, family.

Friday night, being Cousin Stacey's first day in town, we left the kids with Mom and we all went out, them, the Taters and us. I drove the van to High Winds casino, but when we decided to leave there and head to Seneca I gave the keys to Paul. I don't have the best night vision and Highway 10 scares the piddle out of me at night. We were heading down the highway, him driving, me in the passenger's seat, the Cousins in the middle and the Taters in the back. We were chatting and laughing until we got the place in the highway where it jigs sharply one direction then immediately jogs back the other I said "Ooh! I just HATE this part of the highway!" And that exclamation alone wouldn't have been so entertaining had I not been fluttering my hands in front of my face like I was defending myself from a herd of wild moths batting their wings at me. I punctuated the hand-fluttering with more squeals and oohs! as well. Bub, a man of very few words, a man also not known for his quick wit and sarcasm abilities, said, "Man, I am so glad you're not driving. Otherwise we'd all be sitting back here saying 'Jesus, take the wheel!'" I thought Cousin Stacey and Tater were going to need medical attention. He so rarely comes up with zingers like that, it was the fact that he said it at all, not that it was all that hilarious.

Saturday night Mom and Uncle David came out, as well as the Taters, for dinner and Family Game Night. We had planned on playing games, but what we ended up doing was just sitting around in the living room, talking. That is literally all we did. We told stories on each other, Mom and Uncle David told us about the time when they were kids and a tornado hit the farm, we told about the kids when they were little, we talked about Papa - we just visited. Mom has said many times that people have literally lost the ability to visit. Not us. Boy, we are the visitin'est family around.

We started talking about driving and of course, the story from the night before came up. We all laughed loudly when Tater imitated my fluttering hands and Bub saying, "Jesus! Take the wheel!" and Uncle David, being the most innocent and precious man to ever live besides Jesus Himself, said, "Hey! That should be a song! We should all let Jesus take the wheel!" It took us all awhile to be able to tell him that indeed, it already was a song.

Monday, after the funeral, we went to town to eat lunch with Mom, Uncle David, Cousins Keith and Alyssa (who are going to be parents soon!) and the Taters. We lingered long after the food was gone, laughing and telling stories and again, just visiting. Somehow during the conversation I said the phrase, "I can't believe you said 'sonofabitch!'" and Tater said, "And I can't believe you said 'sonofabitch!' in front of Abby!" Cousin Keith, being somewhat deadpan at times, calmly said, "It's okay, Tater. Sometimes tells me that isn't the worst thing those Diva kids have ever heard." Abby, who was coloring on the tablecloth at the time, looked up over her glasses and shook her head seriously. "Nope. I've heard much worse. Tuh-rust me."

When we stood up to leave, two tables full of EMS workers and police officers thanked us for the entertainment. I'm going to truly believe we entertained them and not believe what Paul said - that they were taking down our license plate number as we left so that they could call DHS.