olivia jean may

Our week ended with attending church to listen to Tom's last sermon at Westminster and to see our niece Olivia get baptized along with her cousin Sadie (Krista's twin sister's daughter).  

bells will be ringing

and ears will be ringing too!!

Tom's family did their annual bell ringing festivities after Christmas this year instead of before so we all drove down from Gainesville to Athens Saturday afternoon to ring away.  Our boys, along with most everyone else, LOVE this tradition.  It is one of the few times we get to see Zach's dad's family and I personally look forward to it every year!!

may family christmas

We just got home from the May family Christmas.  5 days of presents, food, settlers, guns, basketball, parks, movies, kids, playtimes, rest times, button pushing, the normal disagreements and great chats.  Basically all the things that makes family family!  It was fantastic to all be together!  Especially since there is a good chance that is the last time we will all be together in that house as Tom and Linda are moving to Lafayette, GA in January.

  I'm not going to lie, sometimes it's difficult for Zach and I to be the oldest of the group because we are pretty much always the first to navigate everything.  The first to move out, the first to get married and leave and cleave to each other, the first to figure out how to be parents, and so on BUT on the other side it's such a blessing and honor to have watched and continue to watch his siblings grow up and get out and make their own families.  To see them grow and go through things we already have and be able to either share (if they want) and even more fun to be reminded of all of our new beginnings while watching them.

I know I say it a lot but God has given me two wonderful families who love me, my husband and my boys and I am so very thankful!