Tuesday, May 13, 2008

We are family...

With only 5 days to do it, we managed to see every member of our family, survived 2 plane trips, and survived to tell about it! We left on Wednesday and drove to Birmingham, where we stopped in and visited with Aunt Elizabeth (Chad's sister) and the girls' cousins, William and Warner. Aly always loves seeing them, and looks up to both kids so much. From there, we flew to Dallas, and had a whirlwind of a trip visiting with family. We had adjoining rooms at the hotel with Nana and Papa- Aly loved being able to wake up every morning and knock on their door to say, "hello!" (that really beats talking on the phone!) We saw my brother and sister-in-law Chris and Cortney, and met our precious nephew, Ben, for the first time. We then went to the wedding of Matt and Jackie, my brother and sister-in-law, and also met sweet Ava for the first time--she is only 5 days younger than Caroline. Between receptions, bar-b-ques, and just hanging out, we were really able to enjoy some great time together. As emotionally hard as this weekend could've been (we haven't all been together for almost 2 years, and Matt is leaving for his second tour in Iraq in just a couple months), we were really blessed to have had a great time. Since being home, we have all moved our bedtimes up, sworn not to leave the Rome city limits for awhile, and discovered that poor Aly has strep throat... but we couldn't have asked for a better weekend. How fortunate and blessed we are to have the family that we do!

Aly and Chad waiting for our plane


The 'new' Bonner family: Matt, Jackie, and Ava


Several Generations


Nana, Papa, and Ben


Nana and Ava


Sweet Caroline

Aly and Uncle Matt in his fire truck


The cousins: Aly, Ben, Ava, and Caroline


This is just a quick video of Caroline playing "Peek-a-boo"!

No comments: