February

February

February is a busy month for us. It's our anniversary, Valentine's Day, and Aaron's birthday. To add to the chaos we decided to fly out to Arkansas to watch Heather's kids for a week. Aaron was really thinking about a career with Walmart and he knew that he would get some great experience working with them to put under his graduate degree. Heather wanted to fly out to meet Craig in Costa Rica so they could play together while he was working out there. Since Aaron was looking into Walmart, she paid for our airfare and we agreed to watch the kids so Aaron could meet with a recruiter and see where we might live. The closer it got to it, the more we prayed about it, and a career in Walmart just never felt right. So we flew out and had a mini vacation in Arkansas instead.

Arkansas

 This was Grace's first flight and we were a little bit terrified. It was only a few hours long, and loaded a bunch of snacks and made sure the Ipad was charged so she could play some games. She did awesome. No tears and no screaming. Success.

Goodbye Las Vegas

Hello Arkansas

Heather picked us up at the airport and showed us around Bentonville a little bit. We told her we were excited to be on vacation, and she laughed at us because we thought this would be a vacation. Aaron dropped her off at the airport the next day and suddenly we went from a family of three to a family of seven. For the most part, they were great! I felt like I lived most days in the kitchen though, as soon as I had finished cooking and cleaning up the kitchen, it was time for another meal. I also didn't realize just how much you could ruin someone's life by giving them the wrong color of plate or cup. Foods that would last me and Aaron a week (bacon, chips, ice cream) lasted one meal. Ty must have been going through a growth spurt because he was always hungry. Even if he had just eaten four plates of spaghetti. He also loved to ask us "Guess what?" and read us Dinosaur books constantly.

Heather's house is absolutely gorgeous! Holy cow! Their kitchen was the size of our whole house, and they legit have a sitting room. Their neighborhood had two different parks that were perfect to walk to. We spent a lot of time with the littles there when Brooke was in school. (Jace was too sick to go to school, but he wasn't too sick to miss out on Krispy Kreme or the fun places we went to.)

Walton's 5-10 was one of the first places we went to as a group. The kids loved their smiley pins and looking at all the candy at the store. Aaron loved the Ford truck!

Heather cracked me up because she said Jenni had given up naps. Not only did she take a nap everyday we were there, she fell asleep everywhere. She took a nap standing up with her head resting on a chair, she feel asleep in the middle of the stairs, at the bottom of the stairs, on the playroom floor, and on the couch. Poor little thing. We must have tuckered her out. She was also the absolute sweetest! We would have taken her home with us! 

Heather's room has this gorgeous tub. The kids loved swimming in it every night before bedtime. These littles absolutely stole my heart!

If it wasn't the dead of winter, Arkansas would be so beautiful. It's all trees, grass, rolling hills, and old barns. We took the littles and explored some of the trails.

Those cheesy grins though!

 The Native American Museum
All of the kids wanted to go to this museum. It was so cool. Their very favorite part was the tepee out front, and the hidden arrowheads hidden in the rocks. Each of the kids got to find one. Brooke found over thirty, so she had to pick her favorite one. Jase thought she was taking too long choosing so he threw half of her arrowheads into the rocks. There were a lot of tears because he threw her favorite one away. Sometimes siblings just tease too much.

About a week after we got home, Heather sent us this picture. Jenni named her newest toy Grace after her favorite cousin. Aw!