[Warning - long boring detailed journal entry ahead] I was a slacker picture taker on this trip. I think I only took three pictures, but Jeff snapped a few. I was having WAY too much fun to stop and take pictures! We spent the weekend down in our old neck of the woods in Texas. Saturday Jeff's sister Lesley and her family moved to Denton (yay for closer - yay for Texas). We were thrilled to help them for a few hours in the morning. They found the cutest place for such a steal and we are excited for them. It was great to see her little ladies (Emery is in the pic with Harrison - did I take an of Addy? No. Grr). They are growing up so quickly. I loved seeing Addy's little personality as it was the first time I've spent much time with her since she is standing on her own two feet. The cousins all played nicely while everyone moved furniture and boxes trying to get them all settled in. They managed to turn anything long and skinny into a light saber. They would get taken away until they found the next long and skinny thing.
Saturday afternoon we went to Ayla Rowntree's birthday party. It was a swim party, so we brought Sarah along and the kids had a great time. I dove in once and spent about 5 minutes in the pool with Harrison, but spent most of my time gabbing with the ladies (SO happy to see Mimi and Tricia).
Next we made a quick visit to my grandpa's house. He made us a delicious salad and smoothie dinner. It was great to see him and the kids were very good at his house. Harrison was getting fussy and we knew he needed to get settled in for the night. The big kids really needed to go to bed earlier too, so we headed back to Keller.
We made a quick surprise stop in a the Coburns and enjoyed a little visit with Kris and PJ. They have beautiful twin girls that sat quietly on their laps and watched us. About half way through they switched laps. They are adorable. It was great to see them doing so well and catch up a little bit.
We stayed with Bonnie and Jason Williams. They were SO good to us and we enjoyed their company tremendously. Their kids are all older than ours and took great care in playing with our little guys. After I got the kids settled in Mimi and I snuck back out for some time together. I made her go to Wal-Mart with me - how boring am I? : ) I was exhausted and loopy. I'm glad she is such a good friend and didn't mind my loopiness.
Sunday morning we visited the McKassons. The kids were having such a great time and we were gabbing and loving them and Jeff said, "we've got to go NOW!" I was so surprised at his rush that we quickly gathered everyone and headed out. Once we got to the car I asked him why we were in such a rush and he thought that church started at 11. We called to make sure it was 11:30 and then realized we had just a little extra time. We dropped off a few groceries at the Vorwallers (they invited us for dinner and Jeff offered to make a meatloaf) and realized that we had about 15 minutes until church and we hadn't thought of feeding our kids any lunch. We stopped by three member houses to ask for a pbj. I couldn't believe I'd forgotten about lunch. No one answered, so we went ahead and picked up some chicken nuggets for the boys. I don't believe I've ever seen anyone bring chicken nuggets into church before. Leave it to us to be the first. We talked to the boys about our options and Lincoln was very understanding, but Jackson was exhausted and hungry - he even fell asleep between McD's and the church (about 2 blocks).
Church was wonderful. It was great to see so many familiar faces and I even had a little missionary moment in the mother's room. It was hard to choose which ward to go to because our ward has been split twice since we left. There were still a lot of people that we didn't get to see, but what a fun thing to see the ones we did!
Everywhere we went the kids would beg to stay or come back. They didn't remember anyone, but they loved being in all of those places again. We had such an abundance of great people in our lives in Keller and I'm so glad for their influence in our lives. I kept telling the kids that they would have just as much fun at the next place - and they always did!
After church we had a great, relaxed visit with the Vorwallers. Harrison finally took a good long nap (yay) and the kids played great with theirs (mostly nerf guns). I loved seeing how grown up all of the kids were and was so impressed with them. Time flew and it was an hour past our leave time when we looked at a clock.
I'm so grateful for the wonderful people in our lives and the friendships that feel like family. We love living in OKC, but we also love that we still feel right at home in Keller.
Amy rode back home with us and it is always fun to have some time to catch up with her. For example, she changed jobs two weeks ago and we had no idea! : ) We also watched some funny youtube videos with her on Jeff's phone. Tim Hawkins is hilarious. Cletus take the Reel. Too funny.
