Our last 10 days...

 We left Vegas on Thursday, August 15th and headed down to Gilbert to spend our last 10 days with everyone down there.  I felt like such a crazy woman that whole time.  Excited, emotional, stressed, nervous, sad.  We tried to fit in as much fun as we possibly could, as well as tie up all the loose ends before leaving the country.  Nate sold a car, flew back and forth from Vegas in 24 hrs to officially 'sign out', and ran all over the place trying to set things up for when we got to Germany.  I did some shopping, packed, and repacked, and packed some more.  I was so happy to get to spend time with all of my family.  Syd & Mitch were able to come out for a few days, which was such a nice bonus.  We decided that since we were actually all together, we would try and take family pictures.  Initially we were going to pay someone to take some really nice ones for us.  As the day got closer we realized that with 6 kids under 5 and David we were probably paying for an extremely stressful experience with not a lot of room for success.  So we opted to do the tripod thing.  All we really needed was one shot, right?  Well it ended up being a good thing we didn't pay anyone because the day before Kristie's baby, Caleb, was admitted to the hospital for a belly button infection and ended up being in the hospital for the rest of the time that Sydney and Mitch were there.  So poor little Caleb is missing from the picture.  Not to mention, Sawyer fell asleep on the way there and had a COMPLETE meltdown during the entire experience.  We were all sweating to death.  Mia decided to dig for some treasure.  And David was more interested in his seahorse than anything else.  But I guess there's one thing that's for sure...we will never forget this day or the circumstances surrounding this picture.  And it's real life.  I love my family so much.  I'm so glad I have this picture to look back on and that I had this time to spend with them before we left.

Another amazing perk of my parents moving to Gilbert, is that they are so close to Brooke (and now Andrea too!)!  We made sure to squeeze in some Garrett time before leaving--we sure love those Garretts! 

David got a new toy.  Good ol' Sully.

Shave Ice!  Always a favorite!

Omi & Opi had some awesome legos for Sawyer to build while we were there.  He put together this boat with Opi.  I'm pretty sure Sawyer did a large part of it on his own!  He's getting pretty good at those things.

Dinner with Mark & Brooke at Joe's Farm Grill.  Super fun night!

And dinner with the Simpsons. Oh how we love these two!