Going Away Party

So I just didn't understand how close your heart can connect with people in a few short years. We have been blown away by how these people have loved us these past several years. Since we haven't had family down there they have truly become like family to us. They went OVER and BEYOND to tell us goodbye. They are irreplaceable loved us and our boys.  These precious pictures are by Chantel.  Not only did she help plan this amazing night, she then took pictures of the whole evening!  She is amazing :)  The detail and time they put into this night is beyond me.  They incorporated moving boxes and packing supplies into the decorations.  Everyone's placecard was a big envelope addressed to them with our new home as the return address.

Then they had gone on our blog and printed a ton of pictures of our family and tied them to balloons that decorated the room.

Details details details.....they had cleverly asked me for my cookie recipe a few weeks before and then made my favorite cookies (monster cookies) and Logan's favorite (chocolate chip).  Really?  yes, really.

And we love ice cream and so they had an entire dessert bar set up with ice cream (mint chocolate chip....Logan's favorite) and tons of toppings.  It was so cute!

This is a text that I sent the day of our party to Chantel and Misty.  They did NOT listen to me!!!  This is Chantel's reply below.  Misty's reply was "mind your business"....which is so Misty :)

my favorite salad.....yes I'm sorta high maintenance....I like a lot of ingredients in my salads and they did it just how I love it!!!

Our ultimate favorite date night place is Carrabbas.  So yes, they even got Carrabbas to cater the main course...Logan's favorite..chicken marsala.  See...I told you they went OVER and BEYOND!!!!

This was precious.  Misty's friend, Katie, painted this of our family.  Then Misty wrote the last names of the families that we love and cherish from Boerne around the outer edge of the canvas.  Then she had everyone paint a thumbprint to make the balloons that filled the picture.  The finished one is FILLED!  It's amazing and hanging in our kitchen so we can see it all the time!

On top of all that they made us a calendar for this upcoming year.  Each month of the calendar is a different family that we love's family picture.  Yes I know!  It's amazing and so so special to us.

First of all we LOVE playing games and competition....but since we have the boys now we rarely get to play many games because we always have to go home for their bedtimes or it's much too crazy to play anything with our friends with all the kids running around.  Well once again they incorporated something we love into this night.  We all played a game of charades.  It was a lot of fun and a LOT of laughing.  The girls won big time but then the boys had some lame come back idea they used and somehow they think they won.  Here's some in action....

Let me just say THIS guy is extremely competitive....he was cracking me up!

What a night.  What an amazing few years it's been living life with these people.  We love love love them.  We have already had some sad times of really missing them and it's only been 3 weeks!  These friends are irreplaceable and we are forever changed by how they have loved us and our boys. 

Moving and Goodbyes

 Well there is much to catch up on.  I haven't blogged in 3 weeks and it's been a very eventful 3 weeks for our little family.  To start at the beginning......we put the house up for sale at the end of January last year.  We had many plans at that time and that plan changed significantly many times.  However, we just kept praying and praying about what was the right next step for our family.  Over time the Lord slowly answered that prayer.  The door was opened for us to move to Weatherford.  Then at the beginning of November our house sold.  It was a long year of having the house for sale with many many hard days of showing the house over and over and nothing happening.  It was not easy on me or the boys to keep a spotless house or to leave at the drop of a hat for a showing but now I can see the Lord's hand on all of it.  He had the perfect timing in mind and His will was ultimately done through it all.  So we closed on the house mid-December and then leased it back from them for a month so we could have time to move and leave well.  January 13th we drove the u-haul up to Weatherford and moved in a rent house here.  We are excited about being here and being closer to family.  And also we will be SO much closer to Kansas.  Here are some pictures of what life looked like the days leading up to the move......

There was lots of fun times playing in boxes, wheeling around dollies, getting taped up :), putting the green car up on a dolly??, and playing in the u-haul trucks.

This little boy is growing fast!  He is about to turn 11 months and it just makes his mama sad that he'll be a year old soon!  He is so smiley and just melts me with his toothy (5 teeth) grin.  He is quite attached to me these days and its just fine with me since normally I run solo in this family b/c the boys are so attached to their daddy!

But sadly the week before we moved got a little challenging because he came down with something like RSV.  It was no fun.  One of the most stressful times I've had was in the following picture.....doing a breathing treatment with Tyson in the dr's office while the other 2 were bouncing off the walls.  Wow...I was more than sweaty when we finally got to leave that office! 

Another really fun thing was that Drew was born!  He was born on 1-3-13.  This is Scott and Catherine's 3rd little boy and he is precious!!!  He actually was big and had some chub on him!  I was more than excited to see that.  We love him so much.  The boys have been talking and praying for baby Drew a lot!

Here are a few of our goodbyes.  I don't like this part of my post.  The party will be on the next post.  Here are some of our boys besties....

This is one of the best nursery workers EVER!  We called her the "baby whisperer" and she truly is!!  All of my boys got the honor of being cared for by her.  She also babysat for us several times.  She loves on kids in the most amazing way.  My boys love Ms. Katelyn to pieces and will be missed big time by them.

This is Mrs. Rebekah and was Weston's preK teacher this year.  She is also so gifted at what she does.  Weston immediately latched on to her and has loved being in her class.

Weston got a fun playday with one of his best buddies Reid.  They had a blast playing in costumes and enjoying the day together.  Weston will miss his buddy!

This picture makes me smile and cry.  This is Weston and Braden and these two have been inseparable.  They have basically been buddies since birth (even before birth).  They have spent a LOT of time together playing pirates, building forts, going to preK together, playing games, running from their brothers, and just laughing together a lot.  This picture shows the difference in the two of them that has been since birth too....Weston the big buddy and Braden the smaller buddy.  Weston loves to pick up Braden :)

This is our last few moments at our house in Boerne :(  We took one last family picture in front of our house.  We moved into that house with ONE 2 year old and we left with 3 boys!!!  God has truly blessed us beyond anything we can describe.