OKC and a wedding

We went to Oklahoma City for a wedding this past weekend and had a great time seeing friends. Odus Compton, who did our wedding 7 years ago this month, married his oldest son Blake on Saturday. Blake and most of his brothers and sisters were in our wedding and they were all apart of Blake's wedding Saturday, just 7 years older! Looking at them so grown up made our wedding feel like forever ago. The Comptons are special people and dear friends, and we were so glad we could celebrate this moment with them.

Nate and Elliot looking pretty guilty after opening their bubbles prematurely.

I think Nathanael would have eaten chocolate covered strawberries until they were coming out his ears.

The happy couple, Blake and Michelle.

Mark with a couple of old friends, Nick Gray and Brad Bandy.

Paula Kaye and Odus Compton, proud parents of the groom.

Friday we met our friends Casey and Sarah Shutt for lunch and a tour of Oklahoma Baptist University. Mark thinks it's been close to more than 8 years since he stepped foot on his old stoppin' grounds. We had a great time visiting with Casey and Sarah. Unfortunately I didn't bust out the camera until Sarah had already left, but this is Casey and their 2nd child, Henry, with Mark and the boys in front of the OBU Bison.

We spent the night with my good friend Dara Steward. We always enjoy our time with her family. I had a great time with a great friend and the boys always enjoy playing with her kids. This is Dara's Eli on their back porch.

Hudson, Evan and Elliot.

Evan and Hudson on the swing.

Hudson took this picture of Dara.

We also had dinner with David and Savannah Patt and ran into some friends from our church in Ft. Worth at the wedding. I didn't take pictures to document, but really enjoyed the blessing of seeing old friends.

Elliot turns 4

Elliot really enjoyed his birthday this year. He turned 4 on June 29th. We kind of made a week of it. My mom took Mark and the boys and Owen to see the new Cars movie. They all really loved it, lots of explosions and excitement.

We also went with my sister and Owen to Jump for Joy, a bounce house place here in Wichita Falls. I pulled the prego card and just watched, but Mark was jumping and sliding with the best of them.

My grandma was up from Austin. She hadn't met Olivia yet and hadn't seen us since November. We had a great weekend swimming, eating homemade ice cream, and enjoying each others' company.

Nathanael and Pappy

Aaron, Grandma, and my Mom (Oma)

Nathanael helping Pappy and Grandma with the homemade ice cream.

Elliot trying out his camping chair.

All the boys in Elliot's new tent.

Owen wanted to get in Elliot's sleeping bag.

Back in Wichita Falls

We are back in Texas, land of unrelenting heat. There was actually a "limit your outside time" warning today and as of 5pm today it was 108 degrees. It's been over 100 since we got here and there's no end in sight in the forecast. I'd take cool rainy days in England over this any day. Hard talking to Mark on Skype when he's wearing a sweat-shirt and we're sweating to death.

We got back on the 8th. The boys did pretty good considering the 9 1/2 hrs we were flying. Nathanael was a little more out of sorts at times than I would have preferred, but I guess one crazy kid out of three isn't bad! Took several nights to get the kids re-adjusted to sleeping, but I think we're doing much better now. Nate still has a few sleeping issues, but he had those while we were in England, and I think it will take a little longer for him. Mark will hopefully come sometime closer to the end of the month. We're all REALLY ready to have him back with us.

The Lord provided a car pretty quickly and relatively easily for us. A family friend sells cars and really helped us out since I pretty much had to do it all with Mark still being in Bristol. Definitely not my choice to be dealing with all of that, but God was merciful and I made it through. We got it this past Wednesday... and so we've joined the mini-van club! Bound to happen I guess!

We went to Vacation Bible School at my parents church this past week. It happened in the evenings and was called Fam-Jam so the parents participated too. I really liked that format as opposed to dropping your kids off. The church is focusing on creating a partnership with the parents, recognizing it's the parents' primary responsibility to be the godly influence for their children and not to be left up to the church. Anyway, the boys had a really great time. I'm glad we got to participate.

Hudson loves to fish when we're at Pappy and Oma's. Oma took him a few days ago and he caught three little ones. I think he was a little disappointed, but it was fun to catch something. Then Pappy took him one morning a couple of days later and they caught some real whoppers! Two pretty big catfish. They all thought it was super cool to look at them, but none of them wanted to be too close as you can tell in the pictures. Nate actually tried to run away.

Observatory, Cave and Bridge

The boys wanted to take my dad to the cave so we went up to the bridge and enjoyed the afternoon together. It gave me the chance to go down in the cave this time since last time I had to stay out with Nathanael.

I think Elliot has to pee, yeah?

Bath again, but this time better!

My dad came over for a visit to see where we lived before we moved back to the states. The boys and I came back early with him while Mark has stayed in Bristol to close up everything. We had a really good time seeing more than I thought possible. Mark kept the boys one day so that my dad and I could go to Bath by ourselves. It was really great to spend the time with my dad and be able to enjoy everything I was seeing without the distraction of little boys! I listened to every audio option on my audio-guided tour just because I could and loved every minute of it!

Random Bath sights.

Narrowboats are like houseboats. They are EVERYWHERE in England.

Maybe one of my favorite things in England, The Roman Baths in Bath are unbelievable. So much history from so long ago!

Statue of Julius Ceasar

A section of the original roof that once stood over the baths.

Remnants of temple steps.

Roman drain, that's still functioning.

Dates back to 76 AD when they think the baths were completed.

The Royal Cresent - a super posh residence in Bath, now also a hotel and museum. Lots of notables have lived here and the great film, Persuasion, was shot here.

Bath Abbey