Give THANKGIVING!

As a military fam, we consider ourselves so lucky to be around so much family!  How often does one get stationed near a family member, let alone 4 groups of family members---from both sides!  Say, "Wha...??"

My parents are in B'ham, my sister and her fam are at Auburn, my mom's whole side of the family is in FL, and now Matt's sister and her family are in NC!  Again, say, "Wha...??"  I mean, this never. happens.  And I seriously doubt it will ever happen again.  (Sorry family.)

Since we hadn't been to visit Matt's sister, Marcie, in their new home, we decided (and they happily agreed) to go to NC for Thanksgiving.  It was so much fun!  Our boys and their boy had a great time together.  Seriously, cousin time has to be the best thing in the world.
+ really good food
+ really enjoyable company
+ really neat and quick road trips

I had brought some foods for the feast, but Marcie and Tyson are pros at cooking Thanksgiving.  (Has to be one of the top 3 turkeys I've ever had.)  I guess they have been doing Thanksgiving by themselves for over 5+ years straight.

After the Day of Thanks, we were able to have shopping trips around their town, able to go and visit Duke University only an hour-ish away, and even us adults were able to go on a fun double date.  Saweet stuff.
OH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  And not to mention visiting Pre-Revoltionary sites.  Yay!  Really lots of fun. A battle happened between some unhappy settlers and the British Royal NC Governor.  Could be considered the first battle of the Revolution... but... not really.   So the boys and us adults frolicked around the field, checking out positions, reading old statues, and taking a nature walk through the woods.

North Carolina.  You rock.  And now that you have the residence of Marcie, Tyson, and Jaxson, you rock even more!

To Western NC!

We had this great opportunity to attend my really good friend's daughter's baby blessing… How often does that happen?!  Certainly not very often.  From where we live and where they live, it's only a 4 hour drive.

So the night before, on a Saturday, we took the drive up from low-land coastal GA to mountainy western NC.  We jammed into Matt's Carroll, haha.  It was a fun drive up, and we were able to stay in a hotel with a pool.  The boys loved playing in that pool!  (We're so ready for summer time.  Just 2 more months till our pool opens.  Anxiously awaiting.)

Sunday morning we woke up and were able to make it to the meeting in time, and meet up with our friends!  (Just 10 minutes down the road, yay!)  These friends were a life-saver my first year at college in Idaho.  Christi and Dana = amazing women.  

This was for Christi's baby's blessing.  The first girl in our bunch of kids.  Crazy awesome.  

After the blessing, we were all invited to Christi's home and we had a wonderful brunch.  After staying for almost 2 hours it was time to head back off the mountains and back to the swamp.  But what a fun little weekend!  (And Matt and his new camera were the official photographers, haha.)

Seriously gorgeous!

Trying to wrangle the kids.

Many friends were able to come to the blessing,
and quite a few us were Brigham Young University-Idaho alumni!  Filing up the world, we are! 

Us three, together again.
And hopefully together again very soon, again!