SOS and Georgia

Justin was sent to Montgomery, AL for training last month, so Mason and I joined him! Well, we joined him on the drive down to the south and then we stopped at my parents' house in GA. I love being home. The weather was perfect, the people are wonderfully familiar, and the shopping is right around the corner. Mason is now bff with his Aunt Kristi (aka Kris) and Uncle John (aka Ohn) after playing with them everyday. Of course he loved living with Grandma and Grandpa and Granny. And it will take me weeks to unspoil this little boy with all the love and sweets and attention he received down there. I'm okay with that.
Here are some pics of what we did while we were down there:

Justin and I visited the Birmingham, AL temple with my mom and dad. We attempted to take a pic of ourselves. . .
We visited my dear friend, Merle Bean, who just turned 102 in February. I love this woman! She is still cracking jokes and playing the piano. There is one century and one month's age difference between Mason and Merle. I hit 20 weeks on my pregnancy, so we took a halfway pic. I think I'm wearing the same outfit as my halfway pic of Mason's pregnancy. . .
We took a trip to Yellow River Game Ranch. I used to go here all the time as a kid and LOVED it. I'm not sure it's as fun as an adult, but Mason seemed to like it! Justin braved feeding the animals and getting all slobbery and gross. I held the camera.
Mason found a little girlfriend (Becca Paige Bartlett).
We went swimming with Aunt Lisa, Uncle Pete, and cousin Zeus. The water was freezing, but Mason didn't seem to mind. I'm grateful that Lisa and Pete were willing to splash around that freezing water with Mason, because his mama was in shock with the cold temps.
We celebrated both Mason's and Justin's birthdays with friends. My granny helped make this Mater cake and it was so fun! Well, I must say it was long and maybe a bit stressful, too, but I had a blast working with my granny. I took pics of the process just to remind myself what a miracle fondant is and also what a cake master my granny is!
Here's the bday party. My Dad and Jessie took some better pics, but this is what we captured on our camera. We had a pinata and we pinned some tails on a donkey (not our neighbor's obnoxious donkey, just a plastic picture). It's so fun to see my friends' adorable kids growing up! !!
Uncle Nick came to visit! So glad he made the drive for such a short stay, but Mason loved playing with him! (The picture doesn't really reflect that, but he really did have fun with him.)
So now we are back in DC. The trip home was great, thanks to the help of our new portable DVD player (why did we take so long to buy one? Must be craziness). I got to listen to Mason's new 40 Years of Sunny Days Sesame Street DVD, and it was fun to remember all those old songs.
Now we are trying to unpack, restock our house, and clean away all the dust. Justin is taking the week off since we only got to see him on the weekends for most of the stay. Mason missed his daddy so much during the week, it was hard to watch. But the reunions were priceless! It was a long trip, but I'm so grateful we got to stay with family for so long.
LOVE YALL!