Goodbye to Texas...at least for a while...

Well, we were soooooo sad to have to say goodbye to our sweet Texan friends for the off season.  Joe's contract is up this year, so we'll see if we get to go back to Texas or not.  It's sad to think of not being able to enjoy our weekly dinners with our WONDERFUL friends, but at least we had the AWESOME time with them though out the past months.  That's really what we need to focus on... all of the wonderful times we shared together.  It was great to enjoy friends that are in the same phase of life as we are.  I don't think people have that connection very often--let alone with an entire group of friends!  We are truly blessed!!!  Who knows, maybe we will be back!  I hope so!  Here are some pictures of our fun last dinner together.

Here's the gang!  Jason, Erin, & Logan,  Joe, me, & Gavin,  Seth, Ashley, & Ben.  Such sweet sweet friends!!!  We miss you all already!!!

Us girls with our boys...

Our silly crazy boys...

Seth & Jason taking charge of bath time!

It has been such a fun last year or so.  God knew exactly what I needed-- good friends outside of the NFL, and He gave me that and sooooooo much more!  Even after only knowing them for a few days, it felt like I had known them for years!  You guys are such a blessing!  

Before we knew it we were on the road headed to Michigan!  Crazy!!!  This is how our schedule went...

Sunday: Joe was in Phili for the 3:15pm game.  We lost by a horrible amount.  Joe got home at midnight.  We still had our real Christmas tree up, as well as all of our decorations, so we took those down from midnight until 3am!

Monday:  Joe went in to work for an hour or so, while I stayed home and tried to pack pack pack and tie up loose ends!  When Joe got home we hit it hard and packed some more.  At 6pm we went over to Ashley & Seth's house for our goodbye dinner.  (The pictures from above.)  We left their house around 10pm and had to run into downtown Dallas to drop off our rent check. We got home, put Gavin to bed, and packed & cleaned until 3am again!  We dropped--exhausted--into bed!

Tuesday:  At 6am we left our house to begin the drive to Michigan!

Crazy, or what?  We were totally not expecting the loss, and thought we would have at least another week to finish things up and say our goodbyes!  Needless to say, Monday night I balled my eyes out!  It was so hard to leave our friends, but I think I've probably already said that a few times! :)

Here's some pictures of our trip to MI...

Peek-A-Boo is a life saver!

Thank goodness for our travel-sized dog, Doodles!

We made great time!  Gavin slept a lot, so at one one point we drove 9 hours with one 15-minute stop!  That's got to be some sort of record!  Gavin was a trooper!  We stopped at a McDonald's with a play place for dinner.  Gavin LOVED this!

Daddy helping Gav climb!

Before we knew it, Gavin was napping again!  Yay!

It was cool to see the progression of snow.  A sprinkling of white here, a few more sparkles there, and pretty soon everything was covered in white!

We stopped in a hotel for the night, and enjoyed swimming and burning some energy.  Day 2 was still a bit rougher though.  We did 12 hours the first day, so we only had about 5-hours the next day.  Yay!

My cousin Amanda, her husband Luke, and their little guy Caden (3 months younger than Gav) came from Florida to Michigan over Christmas.  They stayed with my Aunt & Uncle (1 1/2 hours from my parents house) so we stopped to see them on our way through.  It was such a nice break and it was so good to see them again!  Here's pics of Gav & Caden...

They played really well together and would run and run through the house giggling!  It was adorable!

hugs...

Then they enjoyed a fun bath together...

And we finished up our trip with Gavin asleep again!  Thank goodness!

Wow!  What a whirlwind!  Joe and I felt like we accomplished a weeks worth of stuff in less than 48-hours!  It was crazy!  We were glad to get home and finally relax a little bit!  We are enjoying family & friends here in Michigan.  Thank goodness for lots of distractions once we got here, because it helped with missing all our Texas friends! :)