family & friends

There have been good reasons for my absence here this past week. After my friend Jenn and her family left, my sister and her husband and five kiddos came!! It has been SO fun having loved ones here for a few weeks. Yesterday my kids were wandering around the house not knowing what to do with themselves. I think they'd gotten used to being busy, ha! Today they have mellowed out and are occupied, whew!

I was able to rope everyone into a little family photo shoot at Delaney Farm one day. Whenever we are all together, we must make this happen in some form!

 This is the one and only shot where everyone was looking and no kids (or Dads) were doing silly things.

 My favorite:

My brother in law snapped that last one. I love it :)

Working backwards from there, despite the sickness that scurried through the house while Jenn was here, we did manage to get one day of outside fun in once we were all well again.

 She couldn't resist making her own version of the pool bag. They look SO AWESOME next to each other. These guys could make anyone smile ;)

 Their little guy Asa just became officially theirs this week!! So excited for them. They took him to Build-a-Bear that day and named his bear "Gotcha". So cute.

And we got to go on a double date to the rifle range too :)

Now, you'd think things would be settling down for me ... but, we are moving in SIX WEEKS!!!! Six weeks. Crazy. I have a lot to do. I'm trying not to stress out about every tiny detail. We are moving to Ft. Lee, Virginia for six months for Casey's Captains Career Course. After that, we'll move again. Could be anywhere. We have to drive both our cars, which puts me in our SUV with the three kids and no passenger to help tend to them for three 8 hour days. This part is not necessarily sounding that stressful to me, actually, although your ideas for helping the kids through it would be very welcome :) The stressful part is getting this darn house ready for renters! While trying not to get super behind in homeschooling with two moves in one school year. So, anyone who has rented a house, moved cross-country, PCSed with the military, moved while homeschooling, driven with kids for several days--insert your best advice in the comments!!!!