Walker Family Reunion 2: Day 2

Friday morning we arrived at the Walker Family Reunion at 9 am for the opening ceremonies.

After Bob Walker's speech, we proceded to go on the factory tour.
Safety goggles are required. I gave Jack a pair but they didn't make it past thiry feet. I am still not sure where they landed. The tour was really interesting. Walker Manufacturing starts from scratch with every mower. They turn sheets of metal into mowers everyday. This is one of the more exciting pictures from the production tour. We let him out of the stroller to walk around with us.
After I put his "stay close backpack" (aka leash), he found the mowers. There were rows and rows of them, he was so excited.
We even managed to snap a quick picture with the 100,000th Walker Mower.
Jack LOVES to sit on the mowers. We found this one was out of the way of teh tour traffic so I let him sit on it for a few minutes.
He got pretty comfortable.


And cried when it was time to move along. His screaming echoed through the large warehouse.
At the end of the tour was a course set up for Walker Skates. The owners of Walker created these zippy "skates." Mike and Chase spent quite a bit of time here.
Jack watched.
Then he fell asleep. It was REALLY hot outside, the poor guy had a hard time keeping cool during his nap. Dark blue was a bad choice for our matching shirts. We all voted next time we get white or tan.


I kept hydrated.
After Jack woke up we went and explored the vendor tents. We found a kids' area set up at the back of the circus tent. Jack and I spent a lot of time there. He found markers and crayons to color with, Little Tikes houses to play in, DVDs and books, and in the mornings there were face painters, a characature artists, and balloon expert.


He loved going down the slide. I helped him climb back up the slide since the ladder was too hard for him to handle.

He liked swinging...
Then decided he wanted out...

In the afternoon, there was a ceremony for the 100,000 mower. We attended that in teh 102 degree sunshine. I bought Jack a Walker shirt so he could stay cooler. Sarah helped too by pouring water on him.

At 4, when the first day's activites were over, I got in the car and as proof that it was terribly hot, I took a picture of the temperture in the rearview mirror. It read 108 when we got in and 102 by the time we got back to the hotel.
That night we had a Coates Landscape dinner at the hotel with all those who had attended the reunion as part of the Coates Family. Jack didn't stay in his high chair for too long. We were prepared with plenty of toys. Hayden and Camden were happy to get out of their chairs as well. They all played well together.






Oh yeah,

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, JESII !!!