A Tale of Two Friends (x2):
When we moved to Florida, Aubree was three months old. Our first friends in our new ward, Matt and Sarah, also had a little girl, Rachel. Rachel is one month older than Aubree. Despite being babies, Aubree and Rachel became friends. It seems ludicrous to think of now, but I have memories (and picture-proof!) of them playing and talking together.
Unfortunately, our friends moved across the country shortly after Aubree's first birthday. Since then, Aubree and Rachel have seen each other twice - once when they were 20 months old and once when they were 3. Both times they immediately reconnected. Now that they're five, I was curious to see how their reunion would play out. Would they be more reserved? Would they still get along?
After our long day of travel, we walked into Sarah's home around 7 pm. Before we'd traversed the 6 feet from the front door to the staircase, Aubree and Rachel were holding hands, chatting, and giggling. They spent the following week attached at the hip: staying up way too late talking, sharing stories from their favorite books, playing games, making new memories. Those two girls are eerily similar, yet different enough to keep things interesting. They encourage and inspire each other to be better. Long lost friends. Kindred spirits.
Ditto (ditto, DITTO!) for their mommas.
We had a wonderful time visiting with Sarah and Matt. They opened their home to us, and despite the fact that we doubled the number of kids and tripled the noise-level, they were nothing but gracious.
A few of our days we opted to stay at home and enjoy each other's company. Since our kids all had built in playmates, it made for easy entertaining. Aubree and Rachel were never short on ideas of new things to do or talk about (even at 10 pm when they were supposed to be sleeping). Bryce and Mikey (also 3 years old) occasionally played together, but took a little bit longer to warm up to each other. Bryce was thrilled with the assortment of new toys and quickly attached himself to a large fire-truck. Thane took advantage of the fact that since their baby, Nate (the easiest baby ever!), is still too young to crawl, their house is not yet baby-proof. Thane's favorite destination was the "technology corner." Those Wii remotes and keyboards were irresistible!
Other days we packed up to see some of Houston's attractions. One of our favorite stops was the Houston Children's Museum. I've been to quite a few Children's Museums, but this was - hands-down - the very best.
One morning we took a short drive to Galveston and spent the morning at the beach. I didn't take my camera (kicking myself...), but it was wonderful! I hadn't realized just how much I miss going to the beach. Apparently, it's been too long since we've visited because we started back at square-one with Bryce. He didn't want to have anything to do with going in the water. By the end of our morning, he was happily sitting and playing in the water, but never ventured far from my side (that's typical, if we'd gone back the next day he would've been playing with no concerns).
Thane, on the other hand, thought the beach was the best thing ever. He was furious that I wouldn't let him play totally independently and couldn't seem to understand why he couldn't go in the deeper water with the big girls (who were little fish in the warm water). I spent a good portion of the morning wiping sand and rocks out of Thane's mouth. Yum.
On Saturday, some of our other Florida friends, the Millers (who recently moved to Texas, too), drove down for a mini-reunion. When we added their 5 kids to the mix, it was nothing short of (semi-controlled) chaos. Megan, the oldest (10) did a great job of directing the play of the younger kids. They discovered a play cleaning set and spent a tremendous amount of time vacuuming, mopping, sweeping, and "cleaning" the house. I think I'd like to hire Megan to direct play at my house too!
We had hours of fun playing and reminiscing, topped off by a scrumptious barbecue grill-out (must use correct southern terminology...).
The time to say good-bye came WAY too soon. I'm already trying to plot and figure out when we can see them again.
1 comment:
Oh my goodness, I looked the picture of you holding Aubree and her friend as babies without reading the explanation and thought to my self, "When did Erin hold Anna when she was that young?" Haha then I realized it was Aubree. That is so funny. They looked so much alike as babies. It was so great to see you in Texas! I love you TONS!
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