I'm a Blogger Once Again

This holiday season has been a bit crazier than normal since we were out of town for a week during the beginning of it. To retain my sanity, something had to move to the back burner and blogging was the first thing to go. I think we are catching up around here and returning to some semblance of normal now, so I'm back, Dianne. Here is my update:

Ernie, Madelyn and I flew to North Carolina for a Youth Specialties conference. This was Madelyn's first plane trip. She looks like she is really looking forward to it.

This is her on the plane, however. I think it was about this time that the man in front of us turned around and said, "Maybe she wanted to fly Delta."

Actually, she did very well. Besides having a diaper blow-out on the first leg on the trip (when I had to change her diaper and very soiled clothes by bracing myself with my elbows on the walls of the airplane bathroom because the turbulence was so bad that they didn't turn off the "fasten seatbelts" sign and the flight attendant told me that she couldn't give me permission to take her to the bathroom to change her but I had no choice because foreign matter was oozing everywhere and although she had a change of clothes - I didn't) a few fussy periods (some longer than others...), and getting my hairspray, gel, face lotion, make-up, toothpaste and a few other items thrown away because I forgot to put them in a plastic ziplock bag for the trip home, the air travel went off without a hitch.

While we were there, I had a great time seeing my best friend from college who lives near Charlotte.

And Edward and Elaine, our very good friends whom we hung out with when we were all newlyweds, drove down to see us.

The day we were able to see Edward and Elaine and their kids was very special to me. When we called and told them we were "in town" (which actually was almost 4 hours away), they took off work, pulled their kids out of school, drove to Charlotte and met us. We had so much fun. It felt like old times. We talked, laughed, reminisced, and laughed some more.

We laughed about the time Elaine and I called Edward and Ernie to rescue us because her fancy little convertible wouldn't start. When Edward and Ernie arrived, they explained that the car was still in "drive" and would only start while in "park".

We laughed about our big Easter egg hunt when we hid eggs for each other and I stole an egg out of Ernie's basket. Trying to keep him from getting it back, I tossed it high in the air over my head...and it landed in my basket behind my back. We had as much fun as any kids could have finding eggs.

We laughed about Edward showing up at our door one Easter morning with his head covered in french fry grease because he had accidentally dumped the fry daddy while taking it off the refrigerator and, it just so happened, they had no water that morning.

We laughed about Ernie baptizing Edward in a hotel pool where we weren't guests.

We laughed about the time 8 of us (4 married couples) went skiing together in Gatlinburg and all shared one hotel room because that was the only way we married college students could afford to go. We laughed about Edward and Elaine going back to that same hotel years later and Edward giving the hotel clerk an extra $20 and saying, "Just don't ask questions" because he was sure we should have paid an extra fee for 8 people in the room.

We talked about how priceless it was to have such good friends to challenge, uphold, and talk to as we all navigated through those first years of marriage and grew in our relationships with God.

And they reassured me (once again) that when they named their dog "Mindy Sue" after me...it really was meant as a compliment. :)

Times like this are priceless. I am very thankful for the time we got to spend together.

-m