Family Visits

In the last two weeks we have had lots of great visits with family. Our first visitors were my Dad (Mike), Step mom (Debbie), brother (Nate), and sister (Annha).  They were able to come see us for 3 1/2 days and it was GREAT! My Dad recently had knee replacement surgery and had a follow up visit in KC so they were able to arrange some visiting around their appointment. It is a long 10 hour trip from my parent's house and so their visits are always much appreciated!  Eliana was excited to see "Grammy and Papa" and  really excited to play with Nate and Annha! They spent the entire time "cooking", reading books, coloring, playing outside, and having lots of fun! Crazy enough it snowed while they were here and were able to play in the snow too (Missouri weather is a little crazy)! I took my stepmom to Schaefer House which I love, and made a visit to Arris Pizza which was a lot of fun too! While they were here I teamed up with Debbie and we did some furniture rearranging (my favorite) and had a lot of fun moving things around. The way my furniture is right now is probably the way I like it the best since we have moved here. I will post about my furniture rearranging adventures later this week! Of coarse it was as sad to see them go as it was happy to see them come. We are counting the days until we visit them for my brother's graduation in May! I can't believe he is graduating.....

Owen and Papa playing

Annha and Eliana in the snow

Owen playing with his favorite ball with Annha and Nate

Our next visitors were Grandma Prather (Todd's mom) and Calvin (Our nephew). They made a quick trip to visit us and for Todd and Calvin to have some "man time."  The boys went with Aaron (practically a member of our fam) to the Missouri High School Basketball Championship Games.  The boys watched the games and had a good time.  We also gained wisdom from Kathy (Todd's mom) on our landscaping plans - that you saw were recently finished! It was a fun short trip and great to see them both. Calvin is growing so fast and we can't wait to see him and the rest of the family soon when we celebrate Nanny's (Todd's grandma) 90th birthday!
                                               

Kathy and Eliana playing



Our last visitors of the last two weeks were my brother and sister (Alicia and Alex). They were on spring break and for some reason decided they would spend it with us!  It was a lot of fun to have them here (it always is) and a great help. They played with their niece and nephew while I worked on spring cleaning projects (a blog-post to come about this soon).  We also managed to fit in some fun why they were here - "Awesome Aaron" (as Alex calls him) spent some "man time" with Alex going out to eat, getting hair cuts, and most fun of all playing in the mud. One day the "man time" was suppose to be spent kicking soccer balls but turned into a mudfest (must see pictures below).  After they returned I sent Alicia and Eliana to play in the mud but Eliana refused to get dirty! Instead she decided it would be more fun to clean Aaron's muddy car when they returned. She is totally my daughter - rather be cleaning than getting messy!  We had good family time with them and they are such good kids. My mom (nanna) came this weekend to pick them up and of coarse we did some shopping and then had some movie and popcorn time. The kids were ready to go home and not have so many "daily chores" but overall we had a great visit!

Alex and "Awesome Aaron" from Round 1

After Round 2 in the mud

They had a lot of fun getting all muddy

Nanna and Eliana working on tummy aches from popcorn and m&m's

We LOVE LOVE LOVE having family visit and can't wait to have more family time again soon!!!!!!

Love to all our family - thank you for supporting us and loving us!