Petersons Never Give Up: Peterson's invade Pennsylvania

We planned a family reunion for summer of 2020 in Hershey Pennsylvania. We had to cancel because of the covid pandemic and pushed it back a few summers. We all gathered there the end of June and stayed at Brandon and Michal's house. Each family had a bedroom and all the older cousins slept in the family room space together. Our kids were in heaven!

Our flight left around 11. We were on the same plane as Brian, Jill, Xander, and Lucy. We took a direct flight to Philadelphia this time instead of doing a layover since there were so many complications with the layover last time. The flight was smooth and we got our rental car and headed the almost 2 hours more to Brandon and Michal's house.

Lizzie kept calling the moving sidewalks "terminal B's" I think she was confused since we have to ride so many of them to get to terminal B. This time we actually left from terminal A, although it was as far as you can go!

Brett, Alana, and Lizzie played games with Lucy while waiting for the plane.

Brett read for most of the flight! Lizzie read a ton too!

It took Sean awhile to figure out how to get the car to turn on. Something about holding the break down for just long enough before pushing the button. We aren't used to such fancy cars.

We stopped at a McDonalds for dinner and Alana enjoyed her cheeseburger a lot!

On Wednesday morning, we got up early and headed straight to Hershey Park. Brandon and Michal's family split up amongst all the cars so that we could all use the season pass parking lot. Its a ton closer and free as opposed to the $40 for parking. We used the season pass entrance as well! The cousins would often split up to sit by each other in the cars. We most often had the "L girls": Lily, Lana, Lizzie, and Lexi. Brett usually rode with Brielle and Kaden.

Lexi, Lizzie, Lily, Lana

Swinging in Brandon and Michal's backyard while waiting for everyone to get in the cars.

Cousin picture in front of the Hershey kiss fountain.

We rode lots of rides, ate a yummy lunch, and then went to check into our cabanas. Brandon and Michal rented three cabanas each day that we were there. The cabanas came with towels, cold water, unlimited soda, private restrooms and dressing rooms, private access to the lazy river, waiter service from the cabana restaurant. It was super super nice!

Lizzie really wanted to ride this ride called Jolly Rancher Mixed. She hated it and said she didn't want to do it again. And then as we were swimming in the afternoon she said she wanted to try it again. And then it was her favorite. I liked it a lot too. Sean not so much =)

Both days at the cabanas they gave us 23 of these orange towels and some sunscreen and nice tote bags. We brought lots of towels home.

Lizzie was pretty tired by the end of day one as we searched for some ice cream.

We found some at a mini donut food truck. She ate most of it all by herself!

Eating dip n dots.

The next day we went for another day at Hershey Park. Brandon sprung for the lightning lane tickets for us the second day. It was so nice!

Michal did Rebecca's hair:

There was a massive hair brushing party:

Mr Potato Head is always a hit:

Alana spent tons of time with Lily and Lexi and Brett spent tons of time with Kaden and Brielle, so it wasn't super common for the five of us to be together =)

Brett and I rode a Laugh Track ride which was a lot of fun! We had fun with the funny mirrors:

Pizza eating at the cabanas. We left Lizzie there with my phone and some Bluey (and Mimi) while we went to ride the water coaster. Alana was in the lazy river and wave pool with Lexi and Lily and Brett was off with Kaden and Brielle.

Lizzie and I rode the bumper cars. We both liked driving but not the bumping.

The sky ride is always fun:

The kids wanted to play the plinko game!

We stayed til close both days at Hershey Park.

On Friday, we went to Turkey Hill factory. It was a great museum all about Turkey Hill ice cream and its history and how its made. There were stations to create your own ice cream flavor, then design a cover for it and even record a commercial for it. The kids had a great time doing that. There was also a free tasting lab where you could have as much ice cream as you wanted! My favorite was a peanut butter swirl and a super popular one with the kiddos was the cotton candy one.

In the morning before we left for Turkey Hill the kids played lots of games, Mimi worked on puzzles, Jill played piano, we all ate breakfast, and just enjoyed being in Brandon and Michal's home.

After we had our fill of ice cream and bought lots of fun things at the gift shop, we went back to Brandon and Michals to hang out. Lots of the kids watched High School Musical. Michal is part of the Hershey Symphony and had a concert in front of the medical building that night. We went and camped out on the lawn. They had food trucks and we got lots of yummy food. The first part of the performance was a review of all the fun things they had done throughout the year. The second part was a patriotic concert. They had beautiful music and moving words and singing. They had lights on the medical building right behind the symphony that changed with the music. It was beautiful. They provided chocolate bars for everyone and the kids loved that!

Xander decided that Sean was the best uncle ever and spent lots of time sitting on and being held by Sean.

Of course when we got home it was time to play air hockey. Until the mean grownups told the kids to get their jammies on and get to bed =)

On Saturday we watched most of the mission living lingo that Sean put together. It was really neat to hear all kinds of amazing stories from everyones missions. We went to a small town call Lititz. They have a little factory where the first hard pretzels were created. This was a highlight of the trip for me. They let us all practice rolling the dough and shaping it into a pretzel. They explained all the religious symbolism that goes into the pretzel and how the cross represents our hands raised in prayer. I guess the monks would use pretzels to teach kids how to pray.

We walked through the town to a fun park and then went to the Wilber chocolate store. That was some yummy chocolate.

We drove back to Brandon and Michals for a short stop and then headed to the Chocolatier, a restaurant right outside of Hershey Park. We sat at two huge tables. We had these ferris wheel appetizers then we ordered some food and some dessert. Lizzie and Alana ordered pizza and Sean Brett and I ordered cake and cheesecake. The food was all delicious once it finally came, but they took FOREVER with poor Lizzie's pizza and she was pretty emotional about it! They even delivered some of the other kids pizza and didn't bring hers. The other kids shared and the pizza finally came. It all worked out and the manager comped a lot of the desserts to help apologize for the random deliverance of food.

We went to chocolate world after to ride the ride and wander the gift shop. Lizzie really wanted a blue travel pillow like one Alana got last time we went there. We looked and couldn't find one and then when we got home Rebecca showed us the exact pillow Lizzie had wanted. Sean and I drove back over and found a pillow for Lizzie, a cereal bowl for Alana, and matching t-shirts for Brett and Sean. The credit card machines went down so we went on the ride again while waiting for the machines to come back.

This is another pic from the cute park in Lititz.

Sunday morning we got up early to attend 9AM church. It was a lovely sacrament meeting and Sunday School. We had lunch and played some games at Brandon and Michal's and then we left for the airport. Our flight was delayed but it was smooth otherwise and we had some yummy smoothies and pizza at the airport. Dad Z and Sam (who had just gotten into town) picked us up at the airport. It was a fantastic trip and we felt so grateful to be able to connect with all the Peterson's. We especially missed and thought of Darrell, but I know he was smiling down on us.