A Few Goodbyes........

This week I had to say a few goodbyes to some people that have made our time here in Idaho so wonderful.

Wednesday night I went to dinner with three good friends, Beth, Tricia and Dani. These gals are a few of the gals from our Friday playgroup that I just love to be around. All of their husbands are pilots and every 18 months they kiss them goodbye as they deploy to defend our country. That is one of the many reasons I love these gals and look up to them. They are dedicated military wives and it's through them that I've really learned to appreciate the sacrifice that military families make.

With these gals we can talk about anything and we do! We drop our kids off at each others houses and we each look forward to Friday's at 9:30 when we can get together for playgroup. Dani subscribes to People magazine and passes it to Tricia who passes it to me and I pass it to Beth! It's a great system! We've shared recipes and advice on pregnancy and parenting. I'm sure going to miss them!

I've been involved in 2 book clubs here and this is one of them. We were named the Thursday night book club because none of us could think of anything else! Very original were we. These gals were from church and it was so fun to have a reason to get together once a month and share recipes and talk about books! I could be myself around these gals and for me, thats what makes great friendships!
Today was mine and the boys last Friday playgroup. We met at the park and it wouldn't be Mtn. Home if it wasn't windy so we're all a little windblown in this picture! We were missing Gillian and Dani and of course a few others who've moved in the past few months.

Friday playgroup was my saving grace when we moved here. I happened to attend library time with Gibson and there was a pregnant lady across from me who was chatty and seemed like such a social butterfly and I remember thinking, "If only I was her friend." Well, who would of thunk it but I had signed up to attend book club through the Officers Spouses Club on base and the first meeting ended up being at this gals house! She answered the door and I knew that I had found a friend and that's just what I had found.

Tara and I instantly clicked. Her husband went to medical school at the same school Jared went to dental school. Her son was a few months younger than Gibson and at the time she was pregnant with her second son and due about 4 weeks before I was due with Easton. She invited me to a military playgroup that she had organized a few years earlier and I was SO excited and have rarely missed a week since! It's been a huge blessing in my life and the girls that I've met have become great friends of mine.

These are some of the kids. Of course since Gillian and Dani weren't there we were missing Princess Maddy and Kaden. Collin {far left} and Gibson are about six weeks apart and Easton, Mehren {2nd from right}, and Kaden are all about 3 weeks apart. So the kids have really grown up together in the past two years.

We LOVE this playgroup and we were very, very, very sad to say goodbye today.

Goodbyes are so bitter sweet. The bitter part is of course leaving everything we've had here for the past few years behind. Yet we're so excited to be moving forward and to be starting our forever life. I've always related well to Meg Ryan's character in the movie French Kiss when she's talking to Charlie about the big white house and she talks about settling down and building roots. I need roots too and with this move, we're finally going to be able to put some roots down and start watching them grow. That's the sweet part.