The DENOS Lab came together for a team building lunch in the summer of 2026, gathering students, researchers, and collaborators for an afternoon away from the desks and screens. Over a shared meal the group traded stories from recent projects, welcomed newer members into the fold, and celebrated the milestones reached over the past year. Moments like this build the trust and friendship that carry back into our work on distributed learning, agentic simulation and reasoning, and they remind everyone that the lab is first and foremost the people in it. We look forward to many more gatherings like this one as the team keeps growing.