Trip home December - January

We arrived in SC late on Christmas evening. It was a long day but we were glad to be "home".

First up, a whirlwind few days in Greenville with SuSu and Big Daddy and a revolving door of family and friends. Sadly I realize that currently I have no pics of the family while my sister and her fiance were there (Mer and Steve are getting married in November!!), or of our visit with Grandma and Claire or Joanna, Justin, or Jess and Nick and probably plenty of others.  Ugh, I need to get better! If I get a few, I will add those later.

Big Daddy's present: a light up dinosaur. If you don't know why we gave him this, then you can ask me later.

While Mer and Steve were there the first few nights, Emmy slept on her mattress in SuSu and Big Daddy's closet, which Rags deemed a great place to sleep as well.

We named him Thurston.

With "Aunt" Cathy and "Uncle" Fal.

 On Saturday Lucas, Lisa, Will and Henry came to visit. So much fun catching up! The kids had not seen each other in almost a year, other than on Skype and Face Time. Yowza.

Will and Emmy in their fort.

Uncle Charles was tickling Henry.

Uncle Lucas gave Emmy a paper dolls from around the world book. I'm not sure who had more fun dressing them up.

Lunch at Moe's (Henry's fave and we don't have them out here, quite a treat)

Love this boy.

Friends. They have a great time together, even when it's been months since they have seen each other.

Next up: New Year's XV. I have ended and begun the last 15 years with these folks. Amazing. Emmy spent a lovely few days back in Greenville while we caught up with Da Group.

We then hurried back to Greenville to eat New Year's dinner with my parents and Uncle Mike and repack to hit the road for more travels. I'm tired thinking about all of it again. 

First up: a night in Augusta! Just got a couple of shots of Aunt Mary Ann and Emmy and one of Josh. We had a lovely visit with several of our friends, thanks to Judith and Greg for hosting us at their home for soup and conversation. And Emmy went back to go to bed at Mary Ann and Joel's with Josh and to spend time with her favorite baby-sitter Miss Ashley.

Theirs is still a very special relationship.

Josh was unimpressed and not feeling very photogenic.

We hit the road the next morning for Rome to see DeeDee and Grandaddy and Aunt Beth, Uncle Griff, and most importantly, Caroline! We had not seen her in almost a year, she's a big one year old now!

Emmy had a GREAT time playing "helpful" big cousin.

At Berry to see the eagles. Emmy was unimpressed. Actually, she was tired.

Too much cuteness.

This one is going to have quite the attitude.

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Mama and daughter.

I just included this one because I caught Richards taking photos. :)

We headed out after church on Sunday and stopped through the Atlanta area to see Aunt Sarah.

And then to see Uncle Robert and Aunt Jenny in Decatur.  We remembered to use the timer and take a group photo! Not a bad shot!

Then, as previously posted, we headed to the beach to scatter Sara Hawley's ashes. You can read that post here. But here are a few more pictures from those few days. 

Modeling her new Christmas hat from Aunt Sarah.

Found her first shark tooth ALL BY HERSELF. She was so proud, and so was her Mama.

Look!

Then we headed back to Greenville to get ready to fly home, stopping in Durham for one night to stay with Aunt Mer and  Uncle Steve and visit the Durham crew. Sadly, again, I only took one photo, which is fuzzy photo of Emmy and "Uncle" Josh at supper. He is one of her favorite people in the whole world.

So there is our trip to SC, GA, and NC! I think we hit only three states this time. One of these days will sit on our fannies in one place and make everyone come to us, but it's so hard not to go see everyone!