Dear Dear Friends

We were blessed a few weeks ago to be visited by our dear friends Ann, David (whom Owen calls Dabid) and Lauren Ketch--the neighbors from Winston-Salem we miss so much (they moved to Nashville when we moved to Austin). We had a great (and somewhat eventful) week. They stayed at our (not huge) house which was the first challenge--Owen was in Rebecca's room, Rebecca was in our room and all 3 ketches were in Owen's room! Hey, it worked!

As you can imagine, with 4 kids it wasn't easy to get many pictures taken. This is one of the only ones we got of all 4 kids and it was at like 5am the morning they had to leave. Everyone looks so happy to be awake!Lauren and David were soooooo sweet with Baby Rebecca. (In fact, I think Owen's interest in her started to really increase during/after their trip because he saw how much David and Lauren liked her). She was good practice for them since they're going to have a new baby sibling in January! David told me several times that he was going to go play with Rebecca now "to make her happy". He also (in his new grown-up uber-serious voice) told me that he was going to organize my house. Too cute! (Here is Lauren paying some special attention to Rebecca.)
Having recently been to Uncle Doug's dock to fish with Owen, we decided that it would be fun to go w/ all the kids! Luke and Bailey also came. It was a real circus, but worth it!
David caught his first fish ever--actually, he caught the only two of the day. And when I say that they were the world's smallest fish, it is not an exaggeration...Can you see it in the photo? We were all soooo excited for him.
After the fishing we took a "Texas jeep tour" in Luke's truck and spotted lots of cactus and a few moo cows. Good times.

We also had a great time taking a walk at Town Lake and riding the "Zilker Zephyr" train at the park. But for Ann and I, I'd say the highlight was getting a flat-tire on Mopac (the highway) on our way to have a little kid-free girl time at some neat shops nearby. Yes, having to be rescued by family and a motorcycle cop with a too-big helmet was lots of fun. (You're probably thinking--isn't this the same friend you had all those crazy adventures with at the beach? Yes, as a matter of fact it is. We like to challenge our friendship by always involving policemen and mechanics in our get-togethers...)

We're already planning a post-Ketch-baby-#3-trip so who knows what will happen! :)