Graduation day at last!

Thursday was graduation day. They had a really cool ceremony planned for an outside stadium, but then it rained all morning, so they had to move it inside and dumb it down. We followed Bubba’s directions and got there early and found good seats. 

These pictures are all courtesy of Papa. 

It was a short ceremony, so that’s kind of nice. And then families had time for pictures. 

Papa, mom, and baby boy. 

Just two Army guys, hanging out. 

My only baby boy. Love him so much. 

Jeanne has been so good to him since he’s been gone. She’s a nice girl. 

Christian was able to have 4 people, Matt, papa, Jeanne, and I. 

They tried to gather all the guys from their troop, but this is as far as they got. They were missing around 8 soldiers. These guys went through hell together, they fought, and learned, and sweat, and cried together. And now they’re all off their own separate ways. Christian is the only one from the group stationed at Ft. Drum, so that’s kind of a bummer. 

After, we had the best lunch at the Black Cow. Fried green tomatoes and goat cheese, pimento bacon cheeseburger, and finally the perfect apple pie ice cream in a waffle cone from Kilwins. I’m not even the biggest fan of apple pie, but it was so delicious. 

After lunch we walked down to the river. All the rains had made it very muddy. Almost hard to believe the water that summer had been so clear and refreshing that I wanted to drink it. 

Bubba and Jeanne came over and visited before they headed on their road trip home. Matt and I went and walked our cool trail and then found a good spot to drone. 

Flat rock park complete with a lake, trails, and rocks to climb. So fun and interesting. 

That night we packed up, finished off our food from the grocery store - which I planned perfectly - if I do say so myself, and tidied up. 

Friday morning we left our cute little house by 5:30 and had an easy drive to the airport and back through the maze of the rental car lot and trains. The whole trip was easy and smooth, and I’m so glad we were able to go show support and love for Christian. 

And papa made a friend at the airport. He was taking pictures, like he does, and got to chatting with the lady in pink. I tried to get a shot of them chatting, but masks make it hard to tell. 

We had a turbulent flight home which is always nerve wracking, but we made it safely and we’re grateful for that. We had an easy drive home, where everyone was healthy and happy with Aunti Alli. A+ quick jaunt to Georgia!

Family day

We were so excited to wear our new Army love.  

And the next morning we did! It was in the 70’s, so not especially cold, but I kept mine on all day and was only hot for a few minutes. 

Wednesday was family day, so we met Christian at their bay where they sleep. None of the soldiers have had their phones, but for a few minutes every Sunday, so they all sat on the curb with their phones waiting for their families to check them out. 

I tried to catch the papa hug, but I was a few seconds late. 

We grabbed some pictures with some of his besties. 

And with Smith’s family. Smith and I wrote back and forth to each other and I just love his wife and sweet baby. 

So happy. 

Our first stop was lunch at the food court. He had 7 hours, but could only leave base to go to the infantry museum. 

We meandered around the exchange and then the infantry museum. 

I have to admit that I wasn’t super excited, but it was actually really well done and interesting. 

And Christian was a good little tour guide. 

We left Chris and Jeanne a few hours to spend together and went back to the house. Matt and I found an awesome trail near the rental and we went for a nice walk on it. Then my dad got me started on Downton Abby, a few years after everyone else, but that’s just the way I roll sometimes. 

Walks and Georgia

We’ve all been so excited to see Christian finally graduate from basic training. 22 weeks is a long time! Lexi had Chelsea make these cute sweaters for Jeanne and I. 

I went for an early walk (after the girls bus and before waking Laney) on Tuesday and it was so beautiful. 

I love this time of year!

I adore a foggy, cool morning so very much. 

The pond in our neighborhood is kind of gross. 

And finally, they are cleaning out more trees down Watervale. I’m not sure if they’re just making a road or building more houses. 

This is what our forecast for Georgia looked like. 😩

We got the girls off and tidied up and finished laundry and packing. And then we were off! We were in the A boarding group, so I thought it would be an empty flight, but it wasn’t. We sat together and it was an hour and a half easy flight. 

We got through the maze of the Atlanta airport and took two trains to the rental car place, picked up our car, and we’re off again. Fancy dinner at the fanciest Chicfila I’ve ever seen!

Jeanne beat us to the house by about 30 minutes and it was cute and clean and perfect for us. An easy first day!

Pumpkins and Conference

Last week I went with some neighbor friends to the Amish produce auction. I’d never been and always wanted to. And holy cow!

This was their big pumpkin auction, and none of us had any clue what we were getting into.

We walked around admiring all the wares and wondering what this ring of corn was? I graciously offered to model my interpretation of it. #nailedit

There were 6 of us, so we decided to buy a crate of 40 pumpkins and sell in our neighborhood whatever we didn’t end up wanting, which ended up only being 9 pumpkins that sold within 5 minutes. This was the beauty we won. $4.30 each, not too bad, right?

Our Aussie friends really wanted these straw horses. 😂

These are all out of order, but this is what Ashlee’s 15 passenger BMW looked like when we were through. 40 pumpkins, that we loaded ourselves, 12 mums, along with various gourds, plants, firewood, flowers that we all bought. 

It’s pretty fun to hold the little card up and bid. We learned that after you’ve held your card up once, you can just nod or shake your head to keep bidding or not. 

Proud owners of 40 pumpkins. 

We made a train and unloaded them all onto Ashlee’s porch and steps so we could take some pictures. And I have to say it looked pretty cute. 

This is us with all our stuff. We auctioned from 9-1:30, and we had a lot to show for it. Ashlee dropped me off and my porch looks so fun and festive too. I love fall!

Delaney managed to wait till the first day of October to wear a Halloween shirt and headband. She’s soooo ready for Halloween. We all are actually. We’ve got 3 costumes for the girls, Halloween Candy bought, and, for the first time in our history in LG, we got our Boo’s done before we’ve even been boo’d. We cleaned the church on Friday, along with the Valle’s and Bruce, and it went so fast and was so awesome! And then after that we hit up target and bought our Boo supplies. We happened to choose people that weren’t too far, so last night the girls donned hats and masks and we dropped and ran. We hit one house on the green, so we hid behind a big bush, but unfortunately they never came to the door. It would have been fun to see their reaction!

Delaney and Frankie love guacamole, so D whipped some up with some very ripe avocados. 

I missed a call from this cutest little pig! We got to talk to them today and he is so sweet and big! He talks so much now! He knows all his colors, half his alphabet, counts to 10, recognizes and picks out most letters and numbers, loves the letter Q, and is just the sweetest guy. 

Yesterday was the first day of General Conference and I was so excited that I cried as soon as Pres. Eyring stood up. It’s been such a wonderful weekend, I’m sad it’s over. 

The girls painted and played bingo and Adi took a few notes. 

I caught a sneak shot of them sweetly singing. 😍

I bought a temple picture to paint, and the girls also painted some canvas we had. 

Between sessions we walked down to the little park down the hill and played for an hour. Then before the nighttime session we went boo’ing and stopped to check out one of our fav Halloween houses. 

I love conference bingo. I know that’s silly and it’s for the kids, but I do. I sit with my notebook and bingo card and this weekend I only got 1 full card out of 5 sessions. 

I loved Elder Renlund’s talk about finding unity by putting our discipleship of the Savior first. I loved Sister Eubanks talk about the churches humanitarian efforts and our mandate to help all of God’s children. I could listen to Brother Wilcox talk for hours about grace and God loving all of us that “seek to do so.” And then Elder Dunn spoke about being 1% better, which is exactly what I spoke about at our Women’s Conference in March, so that was cool. Also, of course, President Nelson. I love him so and am so excited to see what temple changes might be coming soon, as he prepared all of us to receive ongoing revelation with open hearts and encouraged us to ask ourselves how firm our foundations are. These are just a few of my favorites, but all the talks were really so good. I can’t wait to delve more into them over the next 6 months. 

PS - as a treat I got 3 bags of Autumn Cadbury eggs and wouldn’t you know, they are all gone. Maybe that will be the only candy I buy for Conference next time.