Baby Meet Up!

 I have a great group of college friends who I am still pretty connected to after ELEVEN years since graduating!  So, get this, last year 5 of my close girl friends from college had babies!!  Jennifer first with Henry, Annie 6 weeks later with Joe (who is 1 today!!), then I had Sadie in August, Kathy had Elsa in September, and Libby had Maggie in October.  How WEIRD is that??  We obviously did not plan this but it's been awesome to share pregnancy and baby-world with them.
         Yesterday I was able to meet up with Annie and Kathy in a random town that just happens to be midway for us coming from different directions. My friend Kathy and I met there last December where I got to tell her in person that we were pregnant. A few months later, she found out she too was pregnant and yesterday, we finally got to meet each other's babies!  My dear friend Annie was able to join us too since she lives close by (which means I get to see her all the time!!) and our 4 kids (2 years old and under) did great while letting the mommies catch up.  So thankful for these women and the role they've played in my life since I was 18 years old!

Sweet little Elsa!

Yes, we did let them play on the floor under the table at the coffee shop :-)

Lucy was the "big girl" at this playdate and was so sweet and well behaved the entire time!  She loved having the babies sit on her lap and voluntarily fed them her cheerios!

We explored the town and got to see some sailboats on the water

Sadie (10 mos), Joe (one day shy of 1 year old!), Elsa (8mos), Lucy (1 day shy of 2 1/2)

Road trip to Winston-Salem!

This past weekend Chris went camping with his Bible Study guys and Ella and I went on an adventure!! We drove to North Carolina to meet up with 2 of my college friends and their kids for the weekend. All around it was a lot of fun but the 6 hour drive turned into 8 hours with traffic so that was TOUGH. We ended up staying an extra day to psych myself up for the drive home :-) Ella was a HERO though. She honestly did not whine or cry the entire 16 hrs we spent in the car together. Amazing blessing! She colored, ate snacks, and read books for hours but I must say I am SO thankful for a kid who is easily captivated by cartoons and a portable DVD player!


What I stared at for a lot of hours

What I looked like towards the end of the drive on day 1. Not. Happy.

What Ella looked like. Silly girl!

My GREAT friend Annie and baby Lucy!

Ella loved being able to feed little Lucy!

Ella had a blast with Will and Thomas, my wonderful friend Libby's kiddos!

Ella and Will are exactly a month apart and played together really well! Ella got to learn all about "boy toys" (i.e. guns, swords, and spiderman dress up clothes!)

A kind of horrible pic of Annie, Libby, and me trying to do a self-portrait :-) It's such a blessing to be close to people I've been friends with for literally 12 years now!

And, my favorite pic of the weekend! Thanks for hosting us Libby! We had so much fun!