so, i finally bought another downloading cord, and here we are. i had so many pictures from before we moved, so i decided to do it in installments. this was charlie's first time in the swing, he seemed to like it ok!

when patrick heard he got the job, mom and bob took us out for a celebratory dinner. we went to fogo de chao, a brazilian steakhouse that is one of our favourite restaurants. it's the kind, however, that you only go a few times in your life. (our lives, anyways!)

charlie was sick and i couldn't get him to sleep before the babysitter came, so he got to join us. thankfully, it was still special for me because i didn't have to hold him. got to love grandparents!

we went to grapevine, a picturesque little town with lots of shopping and restaurants and all kinds of fun stuff. we love grapevine. decorated at christmas it's absolutely adorable. there's also a Great Wolf Lodge, the Gaylord Texan Hotel, the Grapevine Mills Outlet Mall right there, all right next to the DFW airport. did i mention we love it? :-) but we're not going to get nostalgic about texas, are we??? anyways, we love this little bakery/lunch place, where we were enjoying some afternoon specialties. Don't even get me started on the food. last time i had a brie/pear/spinach/pancetta panini. i guess i'll have to make my own now!

so, hannah eats a little more sugar now than she used to! definitely a fan. she's mine and patrick's daughter for sure. and my mom's granddaughter :-).

so as everybody was sitting here enjoying being together, the gorgeous weather, our wonderful food, admiring my precious babies, what do i do? stand up and start getting on everybody to get moving, of course. my goodness, i struggle with relaxing. i did the same thing at thanksgiving when Grandma Jan, David and Des joined us at the Dallas Arboretum. I really must work on sitting still and smelling the flowers, or whatever people do when they're sitting down :-).

everyone is smiling so brightly because they were out of the house and therefore removed from my crazy easter preparations. I decided not to make my braided easter bread, so we could have this special day together. i struggled at the time, but it was so worth it!

sometimes i wish patrick liked to windowshop as much as i do, but it has its advantages. who else would watch the packages and the stroller? and the little tornado?

we had a few redneck sightings, as well. it takes a strong man, that's all i'm going to say! :-)

this is a actually a self portrait. patrick and i are usually too busy to get this close, so it was nice.

Mom and Hannah had a great time doing eggs for our centerpiece.

I just can't get enough of their smiling faces! others may not notice, but I will look back on this picture and notice the living room is empty because we were already packing. that last week is such a blur, especially with having a garage sale and everything. we did have dinner a few nights with friends, and even though at the time it was hard for me to stop working, i'm glad we did it.

patrick drove the uhaul and towed his truck. we moved on tax day, so he voiced our convictions with his "don't tread on me" flag, as he traveled :-).

as i mentioned, those last few days were crazy. we packed the truck one day, then spent the night with just our matresses and left first thing the next morning. patrick let me splurge on getting a cleaner, or else we'd have been up till 2 am. That night we went out for Thai food and Cold Stone and tried to have closure. When you're in the middle of everything, sometimes you don't process as much as you want to. I thought about it on my 9 hr drive, but the kids are pretty noisy in the car. Ok, just one of them actually. We had mixed feelings about leaving. We enjoyed our life there, and will look back on it fondly. That 18 mos was really the longest we've been anywhere, and were really just starting to feel settled. We are really going to miss our church, and food. Grocery store and restaurant food. and having the huge, cheap Frisco Athletic Center 3 min from our house! If I were one of those good bloggers, i'd make some funny top 10 list about this. oh well. That being said, We really are excited about where God is leading us.

and this is where we were led:

you know how sometimes one day can feel like a whole week? i started off in our house in N Dallas, eating blueberry doughnuts that some friends brought. i ended the day, many miles and hours and coffee later, here, in south central KS, a world away from N Dallas. Kansas really is its own kind of beautiful, and as soon as we started driving west from wichita, i was overwhelmed with the bigness and beauty of it. it did start to rain, and we finally pulled up in front of our little rent house, swarming with people helping us unpack. the kids and i fell out of the car, and i went inside. more than a little overwhelmed, i nearly cried then i noticed someone had picked a stem of lilacs and put them in an antique glass jar and set them on the stove. every time over the next few days that i wanted to cry, i went back and looked at the flowers. thank you Jeana!

ok, now we're sort of caught up. we will soon be posting about our new house (currently under contract), Patrick's job, and my indescribably horrible braces!