Our Thanksgiving week trip!

So, we made the trip to Georgia....we left at 5am last Saturday morning and didn't get there until 7:30ish. What was supposed to be an 8 and 1/2 hour trip ended up taking about 14 hours not only b/c of stopping to eat and use the bathroom, but we ended up having to get new rear tires on the van. It was a way long trip and so good to get there! We visited Perimeter church on Sunday morning and spent time with the Ballard's afterwards (here's Kylie with Mary Alex and the twins). It was good to catch up with seminary friends that we hadn't seen since.

We arrived in Ellijay at the mountain cabin of friends of ours (the Lassiter's) on Sunday night and spent 2 1/2 wonderful days of sleeping, talking, playing, eating...with no real schedule and no where to be. Tom and I realized that this was our first ever trip as a family where we weren't traveling home for a holiday or to see grandparents.





Here we are with the Hathaway's (more friend's from seminary) with all eight of our kids. The kids got along great and we really enjoyed being able to spend time with these good friends of ours. The weather was awesome and we spent the majority of time outside playing ball, throwing frisbee, swinging on the tree swing....actually, a lot of the time was spent either getting ready for a meal or cleaning up after a meal... :) It was a great time....thanks, Shannon and Joel, for spending it with us!!! Oh, the excitement of the week was AJ getting hit in the head with the tree swing....she ended up getting two stitches (it wasn't too bad).
The last leg of our trip was in Crossville, TN where more seminary friend's of ours live. We had Thanksgiving dinner with the Quillen's....four adults and ten kids....we were greatly outnumbered, but we had a great time! It took almost 14 hours to get home (although on the way back we drove mostly at night, arriving home at 3am). We were exhausted by the time we got back...the house is a wreck and we're still recovering from the travels, but it was such a blessing to spend time with friends that we hadn't seen (as a family) since seminary. It was nice to catch up on what the Lord is doing in their lives as well as sharing what has been going on in our lives...and beyond that to just spend time with them. Taking care of so many kids in the midst of trying to visit was hard, but the time was still refreshing to my relational heart. Whew, I'm just glad the driving is over, although it makes me not look forward to the drive to Virginia next month.