Be It Ever So Humble ...

Wow! What a week! It's good to be home! Julia and I had a great time going to Mississippi to stay with my parents. We stayed at their house in Hattiesburg, MS with small side trips to see Julia's great-grandparents in McComb, MS and my best friend from LSU in Denham Springs, LA.

Julia was an excellent car rider. I got her up at 4:30 am, changed her diaper, stuck her in her car seat and she was zonked out almost before we made it to the Interstate. She slept most of the ten-hour trip with only a couple of feeding breaks.

Grandma and Grandpa Steele couldn't wait to meet Julia so they drove to Mom and Dad's house right after we got there. (I couldn't blame them. I wouldn't be able to wait, either!)

My parents had bought a Pack 'N Play for their house, but Julia found she preferred a different sleeping spot.
On Tuesday, we drove to McComb, MS to go visit my grandparents. It took a lot of arm twisting (none at all), but Mom and I convinced Grandma to come back to Hattiesburg with us. While Grandma was there we took a "four generations" picture: Julia, me, my mom and her mom!
On Thursday, Dad drove Julia and I to Denham Springs, LA to visit my best friend, Stacy Crenshaw. (On the way, we dropped Grandma back off at her house.) We had so much fun visiting with Stacy, her husband Harvey and their two kids, Cole and McKinley.

McKinley went straight to Dad and made a friend.
Cole was fascinated with Julia and crawled into Julia's activity mat to play with her. He kept patting Julia's tummy saying, "Give me a burp, baby. Come on, just a little one. Give me just a little burp, baby."
Then it was McKinley's turn. (She kept trying to sit down next to Julia, but her aim was a little off and Julia's head was in danger of being squished. We finally convinced McKinley to lay down next to Julia for a little bit.)
This is my favorite picture of the Crenshaw kids. I imagine McKinley looks at Cole like that a lot.
Cole asked to hold Julia after we'd been there for a bit. Julia started fussing and Harvey started to say "Cole, I think she wants her mama," but Cole just reached over, grabbed Julia's bottle and started feeding her! It was so funny. And as he fed her I heard him whispering, "That's right, baby. I love you. You're a good girl, baby."
The Crenshaw family.
Joanna and Stacy. Hmmmm ... can you find the Cole in this picture?
Close up of our doll baby.
Dad and his baby :) Lady did really well with Julia. She was VERY jealous when my parents would hold the baby, but she would only jump up on them, not on Julia. Lady didn't like me too much, though.
On Saturday we made ribs and Grandma and Grandpa came back to see Julia one more time. Here's everyone except Dad.
And here is what David did while I was gone. (This wasn't the only project he completed, just the cutest!)
I called Dave Sunday morning around 9 am. He was surprised to find out that I had changed the plans for the day. Instead of my dad driving Julia and me back to Knoxville and then turning right around to go home, I had Dave meet us in Chattanooga. This cut about four hours off my dad's round trip and let him get home before dark. It also let me see my husband a couple hours earlier. :) It probably would have been better if I had my bright idea before Sunday morning, but you can't provide genius on demand.

(It will probably be a day or two before I get around to uploading the pictures to the Flickr account.)

(Edited: Pictures are posted! Click here to see them.)

(And Dave and I went to a most excellent restaurant here in Knoxville called Peerless for our anniversary. It was yummy. We had the Flaming Cheese for our appetizer. Good, but not exactly what we had expected. I had the 7 oz Filet Mignon with the Fresh Vegetable of the Day (squash and zucchini sauteed with tomatoes and onions) and David had the Seafood Platter #2 with the Sauteed Sherry Mushrooms. We were too full to eat dessert. I think it was the best anniversary meal we've had yet.)