Friday, June 17, 2011

Weddings, Graduations, and Family, Oh My!

The whole reason we went to Ohio was for Justin's sister's graduation. It just so happened that the timing worked out and Justin got to be best man in his lifelong friend Eric's wedding.

Eric and Paula's wedding was at a Catholic church literally 3 minutes from Justin's parents' house.







Justin and his mom at the reception.



Justin and Jessica.




Best man and the newlyweds.



Justin and his dad.



The wedding was a lot of fun.

After relaxing on Sunday and hanging out with family at the house, and running errands on Monday, we went to the Reds game Monday night. The new stadium is pretty awesome. It sits right on the Ohio river and they shoot off fireworks every time the Reds hit a home run. We were lucky enough to see 2 homers. Jared even got a foul ball.



Justin and his ridiculous arm sleeve tattoo thing.




We had great seats and the Reds won (not that I care about baseball but seeing the home team win is exciting.)


Tuesday was Jessica's high school graduation! Before the evening ceremony, we gave her our present which included a bunch of random things for her dorm room next year.



Half-dressed, hah.



The graduate!



All of us Joneses (Jared, Jamie, Jessica, Mark, Justin, Stacy).



The grandparents.



Mark's sister Cara and her son Michael.



Jamie's sister Carla.



Jamie's brother Charlie.



Jamie's sister Theressa, her daughters Hailey and Kendall, and her husband Harry, with his sons Alex and Tommy.




After taking a break from Cincinnati and heading over to Zanesville to see my parents and grandma for a day (it would have been slightly longer but a storm took out my grandma's air conditioning, sadly) we headed back for Jessica's (and cousin Bryan's) graduation party. Before the party, we went up to Mount St. Joseph's, which is where Jess with be attending college in the fall. It's a small school so she showed us around the whole campus.






Mt. St. Joe's is a really nice school and Jessica is going to have a fantastic 7 years there (her major requires extensive study).

Jessica and Bryan's graduation party was an excellent family get together. Since it is unknown when everyone will be in the same location again, Theressa's friend came to take family pictures. Here are a few of the photos she took.


Stacy, Justin, Jessica, and Jared.



The grandkids (and one great-grand baby) from Jamie's side of the family.
Across the back row: Stacy, Justin, Bryan, Tommy and Alex.
Middle row: Jared, Megan holding Damien, Jessica.
Front row: Kendall, Hailey, and Tyler.



The grandkids on Mark's side of the family.
Adam, Jared, Justin, Noah, Stacy, Zander, Jessica, Michael, Sydney and then Mama and Papa so Sydney wouldn't cry.


Jones/Dravlands


We had a great time visiting family and sharing in the special occasions of graduation and Eric and Paula's wedding. It was a long drive but it was more than worth it to see everyone :)

Wednesday, June 15, 2011

Road Trip

At the beginning of the month, we packed up the kitties and made the long drive across the country to Ohio. We left after Justin got home from alert so we only drove to Billings the first day. The hotel we stayed in was kind of neat looking.


We took the southern route which went through Wyoming.



And then to South Dakota.




We stopped at Mt Rushmore since I have never been there.









The next day we drove through the rest of South Dakota and Iowa.



We stopped for the night in Illinois.





After a long 3 days we finally made it to Ohio.