I'm back!

A normal day at last! We took a 10 day vacation visiting family and friends up north, traveling a total of 2004 miles. We had an amazing time but were all thankful to be home and in our own beds. Yesterday was a stressful day, waking up to our refrigerator going out, having to juggle cleaning up all the leakage from the meat in the freezer and keeping the kids away from it, not getting any of the things needed to be done the first day back from vacation... Making us want to just go back on vacation! So let's go back and recap...

We started our journey at 4 a.m, after an almost sleepless night taking care of children, on the very long car ride to Detroit, MI to visit with my sister and her family. We finally made it there around 10 p.m exhausted and relieved to be there. We jam packed a lot of fun into the 2 days we had together, playing at the park, getting haircuts, water balloon fights, BBQ, game nights, Slurpees, and lots of picture taking! Besides the kids not getting along, it was an awesome experience! It was amazing to find out just how alike my sister and I are, even though we grew up in completely different worlds. Her in the city, not knowing that I existed and Me in the country not finding out about her until 2009. I loved getting to know her family, she has an amazing husband that takes care of her and two beautiful children that I hugged and kissed every chance I got. My sister is an an extraordinary woman and I love her like I have known her my whole life.  

We have so much in common it's scary! Spending time with her made me really miss all the years I didn't have a sister, making me feel cheated that I was able to experience all the things we tried to pack in those two days. I miss her already and am really thankful that at least we have the technology to keep in touch over the distance. We left there sad but excited for our next stop, IL to visit friends.

It was so great to see my Best Friend, we always feel at home at their house. We had a day to rest the first day there and the second day we visited my Aunt and Cousins. It was great to spend time with them and to see the home I spent so many summers at when I was young. After that we watched movies, ate great food, played at the park, took the kids to blackberry farm, had a couple bonfires, BBQ, six flags, the boys went to the drag races, and we all spent some quality time together. There were a lot of fun times, all told through the many pictures taken! My favorite part of all? Watching our friends treat our children like they were their own. I love that more than I can express.

I miss everyone already but am glad to be back in our daily routine. Hopefully I can get some chores caught up today...