After a good dinner with family, we all headed back to the good ole HIE in Searcy. Thankfully the kids all slept really well. Maxwell did come get in my bed around 4am but, considering I had a double bed all to myself, I was happy to share…and snuggle!  🙂  The next morning, we took the free breakfast by storm…

and made the lobby our own playground!

These kiddos can have fun anywhere!

So can these adults! 🙂

After breakfast, Robert and the kids and I loaded up and drove to Little Rock to see some of my forever friends. We noticed the traffic start to slow down around Jacksonville and thankfully Robert exited to take a service road and then some back roads allowing us to go around a section of the interstate that was completely flooded out! Had we not exited when we did, pretty sure it would have taken us double the time to get to LR and we would have missed lunch! Phew!

We met some friends up at Local Lime and had a great lunch. I so enjoyed getting to catch up with Laura, Erin and Laura and see their cute kids!

I don’t get back to Arkansas enough so I was glad we were able to make the trip, regardless of how short it was! After lunch, we hit the road back to Birmingham. The kids really were great travelers – thanks mostly to the boys’ new iPads with headphones! The baby did great too and even slept decently on the trip back. Still, after driving 12 hours in 2 days, everyone felt about like this by the time we pulled into our driveway Monday night….

Needless to say, we were glad to be home! It sure was an eventful and fantastic Christmas!

The day after Christmas the fun continued when my brother and his family arrived in Birmingham. The boys were anxiously awaiting Nate and Delaney…

and we were so glad to have all the cousins together!

My brother especially loved getting to squeeze on Samantha. I think he wanted to take her home with him!!

The boys got spoiled all over again…

and everyone loved getting to hang with the family…

even if we didn’t win big on the scratch-offs! There’s always next year!

The next morning we all hit the road to drive 6 hours to Arkansas. We got there late afternoon and went over to John and Cara’s to see the Patterson side of the family! I was so excited for Granddaddy to meet Samantha. Even though her lip is stuck out here, she really did SO well all night despite having only slept about 30 minutes the entire car ride!

The youngest and oldest!  🙂

The cousins had fun playing together and Samantha checked out Tucker the dog.

All the cousins posed together…

and then we even got them to line up diagonally!  🙂

Delaney 6, Maxwell 5, Savannah 4, Nate 4, Spencer 3, Walker 2, Samantha (almost) 1!

We then made all the grownup cousins line up too!

We then gathered all the Patterson boys together…

and finally, the 3 Maxwells! Maxwell Banks, Audrey Maxwell, and Stephen Maxwell!  Quite the trio!

It was a great trip to see family! See you tomorrow!