Leo's & the Picnic

With September upon us, we hit the road Labor Day weekend for what has become a mini Popp family reunion at the church picnic every year.  About four years ago, my brother and I decided that since we hadn't been to the church picnic in forever, we would go. When Grandma Berger was alive, we and most of aunts, uncles and cousins would go every year.  After she passed, we all just slowly quit going.  Here we are, all these years later and its turned into a fun family event for us all.

We travel up on Saturday to stay our Great Aunt Marilyn's house in Garwood, which is just a few miles up the road from Nada.  Saturday night has turned into a small evening event at the local bar in Nada, Leo's.

This place has been around since 1948 and has the coldest beer in town, except on the first Sunday in September where the church picnic will have the coldest beer.

Those of us who come in the night before gather at Leo's to have a cold one, watch football and catch up with everyone.  This year Aunt Marilyn decided to have the food at Leo's.  Hot dogs, chips, dips, beer and football!

This is me with my Great Aunts....

Aunt Tina, Aunt Marilyn and Aunt Esther

And this is the gang who came in Saturday to hang out.  Aunt Esther had already left so they missed out on our annual picture taking ceremony.

Sunday is the big day.  Lots of great food, bingo, live auction, games for the kids, family and lots of fun.  This year we had rain to deal with but it didn't let it dampen our spirits.  A couple of showers came through so we would all gather up and head for cover. Once it stopped, we were back to our bleachers.  

This is looking at the area where all the auction items were.  

And this is "our" bleachers.  Haha!  We claim them every year so they technically are ours.  Not sure whats going to happen next since they are building a new hall.  I wish I had taken a picture of the existing hall.  Its very old.  One of the auction items was a painting of the front of the hall with the date it was built to this year.  I can't remember the date now...possibly 1914??  

I played bingo...and won one time.  

This my friends is a piece of a poppy seed roll.  Let me tell you when I tasted my first bite, a thousand memories started swarming through my head.  Ahhhh, that's the best. 

And this is our crew on Sunday.  Daddy and Lena had already left but I think this is everyone else who was there.

Such a fun weekend.  When the second rain shower hit, it was about 5:30 so we decided to hit the road back home.  Bella, Tony and I were all plum tuckered out.  

About the time we hit West Columbia, Tony starts talking about crashing our cousin Patrick's house.  He and his wife Christy built a house out at Bar X Ranch.  We give them hell all the time because they have had "family gatherings" but we have not been invited.  Patrick's brother David was in town and had texted Tony earlier in the day.  We decided to pop in to see if they were still there.  

They were!  Christy was so excited to have there that she had to get a picture...

LtoR:  Me, Patrick, Christy, Tony, David, Veronica (David's wife)

Love these guys so much and love that Patrick and Christy live close to us.  

I took this picture later.  Patrick and David's mom Janet is one of mom's sisters.  Not often you get to spend the day with family from both sides of the family.  This was a blessing and I'm glad we made the stop on our way home.