Josh's Homecoming...

I have been so excited. I don't know if its that he's our baby brother, or maybe its that I'm more grown up than I was when Scott and Heather came home, but I have been SO excited to see Josh. Of course, I don't know who was more excited....mom or his little nieces and nephews.

Of course he had to take FOREVER to come off the plane, I couldn't wait to see if he looked different. Jim says I'm full of it, but I swear the kid is taller. Hes taller than Scott now, and lots taller than I am...yes I know, I'm not what you would call lengthy, but still...he's totally taller!

I kept looking at him seeing the things about him that were familiar, and admiring the things that I could see where he had grown. One of the things I love most about Josh is his apparent spirit about him that radiates and his good sweet heart. I loved that it was the first thing that I recognized and yet you could tell that he had grown up so much in the last two years. His features are more mature and he had such an incredible glow about him.

I thought she was going to have a heart attack waiting. Mom and Josh have always had a special bond that is pretty evident. There is a pretty big gap between the rest of us and him that he grew up in a lot of ways as an only child. It was fun to watch her and see how excited she was.


Oh and my dad...one of my favorite things about him is to watch him beam with pride when he watches his kids. There are few people on this earth that make me feel like I am on top of the world like my dad does.

But I think my highlight was seeing him and Adam. Its been a gradual change for the rest of us to witness Adam resurface and find himselt, but I'm sure that its incredible to see the change in an instant and to have him there when he's been absent for so long is such an amazing feeling





When Josh left I had gone up with my kids (Connor was 20 months and Lauren was 6 weeks old) and this is the picture of when he left vs. coming home.....



When Josh was getting ready to come home and I was trying to plan the festivities, after talking with Scott and Jim I realized that there was a wide range of emotions that he would feel and that I had no idea what he would or wouldn't be ready for. I always knew that he loved going to the lake with us, but I wasn't sure how he would feel about it so I emailed him a list of posabilities and let him choose. He basically said he'd be down for anything, but never mentioned anything about the lake. So I figured he wasn't ready. After we left the airport we went to dinner and he asked about the blue card hanging from my rear view mirror. I told him that it was our pass to the lake and he lit up...."Lake?!?!" I knew that we definately needed to rearrange a few things and make it happen. It was so fun. The weather was so great and the kids had a great time. Didn't take Josh long to get back in the swing of things!
And of course Jim's signature "You're gonna break your neck on of these times" flips....



Not too shabby, Josh...
The kids LOVED sitting in the bow with Grandma Carter
Lauren's way into her sunglasses lately, she loves putting them on.

How cute is Lilly?
Johhny was boobin about how he was too old, didn't even think he could get up...he was in the water 2.5 seconds before he was riding the ski like a pro. It was so fun to watch how much fun he was having, but as soon as he got back into the boat...he was panting saying, "Man...I gotta start running or something!"

All in all, it was a great trip....very fun and the kids had a great time. The water was perfect and it was fun to spend the time together. Its SOOOO good to have Josh home. So fun to spend time with him.