Sweet Sister Time

Amy and Jared visited us all the way from Louisville for a very short but sweet weekend of saying goodbye and making memories. The following pics are from our visit to a local park here in Richmond.

Such a beautiful, happy, married couple! It's only been 6 weeks and they are the picture of an incredible marriage.

My sweet angels - they loved getting off campus and just enjoying the park. Hannah kept asking, "If this is a park, where is the playground?"

It was at this moment that I realized how perfect it is that Amy and Jared will inherit our kids if something happens to us....don't they look like naturals?!

We found a HUGE fallen tree that Hannah just HAD to climb on. What a monkey!

This is the beginning of our goodbyes. First we took the kids to school where they said goodbye to my two precious children. Hannah will be 8 and Jacob will be 5 the next time they see them. It was very sad.

We laughed and hugged as we quickly said goodbye between sessions.

We took one more picture of the 4 of us in our little ILC kitchen.

We fed them breakfast

And then they apparently got a hold of our camera and took some crazy pictures. I'll spare you the details, but here is my favorite.

Sunday Storytime

Charlottesville on a Saturday

Baby Benjamin West Heatherly

Jacob cooks dinner - by the way he killed that bee behind him too!

Daddy gets attacked by the bee

Jacob collects items neccessary for cooking

Hannah's in the doghouse

Pretending to be a monkey

David and Greg maneuver a large Eco-friendly puzzle together

Attack of the killer bee!!!

Jacob learns all about composting and recycling

Hannah in the creative arts room

Everyone on the butterfly


On Saturday we traveled about 1 hour away to Charlottesville, VA to meet our friends the Cercones! They currently live in NJ but happened to be down here visiting family for the week. We saw them about a year ago when they came to visit us in Louisville. The kids seemed to remember each other at that time and hit it off really well. This time they had no clue who each other was! So funny how so much can change in a year....

Nathan and Hannah were the best of friends in NY where we met and fell in love with the Cercone family. This scenario worked out nicely for Rene and I - we loved to just "let the kids play" while we sat around the living room in our comfy little sweatsuits, sipping hot tea balanced so perfectly on our pregnant little bellies. Yes, we had our boys about 3 months apart from one another so we got to share all those pregnancy joys and woes. Unfortunately we moved to GA when Jacob was only 2 weeks old so we never got to let the boys grow up together and become best buds like Hannah and Nate.

We were thrilled to find out they would be in the area and wanted to see us. Charlottesville turned out to be the perfect little spot to meet up. We walked the trendy downtown mall area for a couple of hours, popping in and out of the boutique and specialty shops. We got pizza by the slice and talked all about our current job and our future one. We took the kids to a wonderful discovery museum until late in the afternoon. It started to rain so we headed to the car and found a local McDonalds to get ice cream and coffee. (Did you know McD's sells their McFlurrys in a snack size with Reese's Pnut butter cup now?!?! Oh perfect sublime heaven!)

After saying good-bye (probably for the last time for 3 years or so), I headed over the UVA to visit my good friend Anna and her newborn baby Benjamin. He was born about 3 weeks ago with a very rare heart condition requiring multiple surgeries. He has had the first surgery and is now in the recovery period. He's done extremely well so far, yet has such a long road ahead. Please PR for him if you think of it.

The many faces of Hannah

The snake

The Monkey

The Teacher

The Baby

My personal favorite - The Dog

Zumba is not my friend

I decided tonight that I was not made to Zumba. It's a little too over-the-top for me, and a little too much twisting for me knee. About 9 months ago I discovered that my knee was really hurting and cracking after any amount of exercise. I went to the doctor and they told me I had weak hips (go figure!) In order to fix this problem, I have to strengthen my hips and tape my knee in place so that it tracks correctly. I look real cute and people ask me what I did to it. Nothing, I say, I just have weak hips...in conclusion, I do not like Zumba.

Other than failing in the exercise department, all else is going well. We are healthy :) although we are growing weary. The days are long and seem to never end. We have a long list of things "to do" that requires us to take turns with the children even once school is over. Our family time is limited and our couple time is even more limited. But we know this is a picture of what our life may be like once we move to East Asia. We'll have language, school, homework, shopping for neccessities, family time, neighbor time, couple time, sleep time, etc, etc, etc. And we all have 24 hours! We must make it work, and somehow we will.

Hannah is doing very well in school, although today she came home and told me they speak Spanish in Turkey...Jacob is also doing well, although his teachers are worried about him because he holds his pee all day long and then cries when it finally does come out....hum, maybe I need to potty train him?

Today is David's 32nd birthday. We didn't get to do anything particularly special but the crazy thing is I don't think he cares! He just too practical to want gifts or cards or anything that might cost money or require us driving 30 min off campus to do. Gotta love the simplicity of this guy.

Well, that's about it. Hopefully the next few days will hold more exciting news. I have pictures to upload, but our computer has not been cooperating. On that note - we're considering getting a Mac...!

Some pics from daily life here in Richmond

Hannah in her new room showing off her new lion, George and her gumballs. She loves having her own space!

Hannah's room - the crib was in the room when we moved in so we left it there for her animals to use for play time

The playground

Jacob playing with Daddy on the swings

Life on the farm

We are now living in Richmond, VA on a farm for the next 8 weeks. We are here to get more training for our job in East Asia. David and I attend classes each day from about 8-3, while the kids attend school. Hannah and Jacob have both adjusted VERY well to being in classes each day. Hannah loves the routine and all that she is learning, and Jacob enjoys being with his new friends and playing with all the fun toys. Tomorrow is library day so they will each come home with a great collection of reading material! We've been busy, but we're having a great time.

We are living in a Quad with three other families. One family has two children so the kids love that! We have our own apartment in the quad with a tiny kitchenette, three bedrooms, a bathroom and a laundry room. There is a field and playground right outside our front door and a gym across the way. Life is good.

So far our family is healthy although there is strept throat going around the campus. We're thankful for healthy kids right now. We feel like we are getting into a routine, finally. This weekend has been great for catching up on sleep and doing laundry, etc.

We hope our blog will be useful for you as you try to keep up with our family's many travels! It's an exciting time for us and we hope you will enjoy taking the journey with us.