Retirement, goodbyes, and the whole fam in one place... what a week!

The sun streamed in through the big glass door to the back deck when I woke up, and I could see that beer bottles still littered the wrought iron patio furniture. A sock belonging to one of the kids sat on top of the grill, along with a watermelon rind. Seth snored in the la-z-boy chair, and Finley yawned and stretched out on the air mattress next to me in the sun room. I could hear little feet on the stairs and shrieks of what was hopefully laughter, and the smell of cinnamon rolls wafted in from the kitchen. I had a little bit of a headache and was in desperate need of coffee.

Mom and Dad throw a hell of a party.

The whole family had converged on Washington, DC to celebrate Dad's retirement and bid farewell to the Bustamantes and the New Mexico Walters. Dad had retirement without pomp or circumstance the week before, after 32 years of service. Sara and Daniel and Lehua had shoved all their wordly possessions into six very heavy suitcases and departed Hawaii en route to their new life in Peru. And Ben had just graduated the F-16 course and was due to move with his family to Misawa, Japan for who knew how long.

There was an awful lot of change afoot. We couldn't refrain completely from wondering how long it would be before we were all together again, and emotions ran high. Thankfully, the first-ever meeting of the four "legacy children" helped to lighten the mood (biting and pacifier-stealing incidents notwithstanding) and the Walters family always knows how to have a good time.

It was an idyllic week, if- as per usual- exhausting. We made the traditional pilgrimage to the monuments and the Billy Goat Trail. We gorged on Mom's pizza and biscuits and manicotti and strawberry pie. We took the kids to the playground and the zoo and the Splash Park, and enjoyed it as much as they did. Missy and Seth went fishing and managed to keep their phones out of the river. The Walters kids all hiked Old Rag. And we threw a blowout retirement party for Dad complete with tears (thanks to Missy's hard work on an incredibly nostalgic slide show, the presentation of a peace pole, and a whole lot of toasting.)

Then, just like that, it was over. Mom and Dad and I stood in their driveway, waving at the Bustamantes- the last to depart- and trying to pretend it was just a normal Sunday. I went home to do truckloads of laundry. I think they may have taken a nap. We all tried not to think about how quiet it suddenly seemed.

And cheered ourselves with the notion that we would have another whole-family reunion someday. Probably around the time we all recovered from this one. 

In postscript notes, the New Mexico Walters all made it home and are still vacuuming husky fur off of all the surfaces in their house. And the Bustamantes and most of their luggage made it to Lima!

We took a million pictures, and some of them are here and here. The backyard photo shoot was hilarious and crazy, and yielded a keeper or two. (Adorable matching outfits are courtesy of Lisa. Obviously.)