It's Hot In Toe-Peek-Uh

Well, it is now, but it wasn't when we visited last week. The weather was beautiful for us. Well, what I consider beautiful, anyway. I had hoped for overcast skies and cool evenings, and that's just what I got. I'm a huge fan of warm weather, but I just needed a little break from this TX heat! And our little vacation to Topeka was just perfect.

As usual, there were so many people we wanted to visit and so many that wanted to visit with us that we ran out of time. It happens every year, but that's fine with us. It gives us more of a reason to visit again and again.

This year was a little different as far as visits go. My sister decided to make a quick trip to Kansas City over Memorial Day weekend and invited Camri and Vanessa to tag along. She dropped them off at my parents' house in Topeka on her way. By the time we saw Camri again, it was the first of July!! She was so excited to visit, she asked if she could stay until we drove there on our vacation. Of course, we were fine with that since she was staying with my parents. That's the longest we've ever been away from her! We even missed sharing her birthday with her in late June. She loved every minute of it, though. She really enjoyed staying with my parents. Who wouldn't?! Now Miss Vanessa had a different schedule. She came home at the end of Memorial Day weekend and brought a good friend along. The friend stayed with us for 2 weeks (2 FUN FILLED WEEKS!!) and then Jeremy met her parents halfway (somewhere in OK) to exchange the kids. Vanessa wound up going back with them, so she was also in Topeka for a couple of weeks before we got there. My independent little girls! By the time we got to Topeka, we were DEFINITELY missing our babies!!

Our time in Topeka was so much fun : ) We spent some much needed time visiting family, visited a Wizard of Oz museum (which I've never been to), visited the Cosmosphere (which was a ton of fun), visited friends and just visited until we were almost visited out. lol I'll tell you what though. Nothing we did (or will ever do) was as fun and relaxing as just sitting on my parents' deck taking everything in. I could sit and watch a pair of bluebirds bring food to their babies all day long. I LOVE watching big fat bumblebees bounce from flower to beautiful flower in my daddy's little piece of heaven that he's turned the backyard into. Watching the kids catch fireflies and place them in a jar just makes me smile. And getting to sit (face to face!) and chat about nothing with my parents is priceless. I love being somewhere the kids should be having the time of their lives at and hearing them say, "I want to go back to Grammi and Papa's house." They love it there and so do I. It's warm. It's happy. It's so full of love and I'm so blessed and thank God every day for 2 of the most wonderful parents ever.