The Last 4 Weeks

It has been a fabulous 4 weeks.  Today has been hard because not only is life back to normal, but I woke up with a terrible head cold. My main reason for writing today though is to catch you up on what has been going on here.

About 6 weeks ago Adam found out that he was heading to St Louis for work the week before Thanksgiving so we headed there with him to see my parents before they jump into bell ringing season.

It was such a great visit. My Dad has mono and while I feel bad for him, I was glad to get some extra time with him since usually he stays super busy during our visits. The girls loved seeing their Papa and Nana. Kaylee helped Nana decorate the Christmas tree.

We had Christmas together while we were there and Mom and Dad got Kaylee Rapunzel from her favorite "Princess Movie". It also came with a matching dress. She loves that doll!

After our wonderful visit with my parents, we went home to do laundry and re-pack to head to Minnesota for Thanksgiving. First stop was Adam's Aunt and Uncle's house. We had a great visit with them and then headed further north to visit our best friends Meggan and Trevor. Kaylee and Addison were fast friends.

We did a lot of relaxing and playing and dancing and laughing! The boys gave us some time off and we did the same for them. We had such a great visit and it made me wonder why we live so far away from one another.

After our few days with the Schwirtz's we started making our journey home by spending a night with our great friends Casey and Daniel. We spent the evening eating this amazing soup that Casey made and playing some Tichu. Adam and I won and I am pretty certain this is the first time we have ever won as a team.

We got home at about 8 pm from our trip and so I unpacked, cleaned, and got the girls into bed while Adam took his Grandma home. (She had ridden with us to Minnesota to spend Thanksgiving with Adam's Aunt and Uncle. - She is brave for traveling with us.) The very next morning I ran to get groceries because our awesome friends Kim and Chris were coming to visit for a night. 

Ella had a ton of fun with Brayden. She really wanted to keep up with him as he was crawling everywhere leaving her in the dust.

We played lots of games in their one night stay. I was so glad they came to visit!

The morning the Hoch's left was a pretty somber event for me because I knew life was going to slow down and get back to normal. I decided to take a 3 hour nap to delay the inevitable. Good thing I did! That evening my brother Michael and his wife Rachel showed up for a week long stay. 

We went shopping, took pictures, played games, ate great food, and sang lots! I was extremely grateful that they flew out to visit! We recorded two songs while we were together. You can find them here and here.

These last four weeks have been such a huge blessing and makes me ever so grateful as we go into this Christmas season. Thanks to all of you for allowing us to be a part of your lives! We love you and miss you already!