Nearly Perfect Is Now Minus One

So this weekend was a big one for our family.

My sweet Annie, our precious daughter and Ethan's treasured sister, graduated high school this past May. This means she is now a college student. Meaning for us, we had to drop her off, say goodbye, and drive away, with her seat in the car empty yesterday.

It's been pretty emotional.

We packed up the car and drove to Provo, it's closer than I thought when we go I70 :) 500 miles door to door :) We took her to The Creamery where she'll be buying most of her groceries and went through what to look for, aisle by aisle. We went and picked up her books from the bookstore, my how buying books has changed! We also went to a local grocery store that had more selection, just to give her an idea of what to do when she had access to a vehicle. We went to dinner at the Olive Garden where I started into labor with her almost 19 years ago. Then we checked her into her apartment and got her mostly moved in. We still had an hour drive to get to my parents house so we left her kitchen supplies for her to unpack and headed to Grandpa and Grandma's for the rest of the weekend.

It was a special time for our family. Full of good times and more than afew tears. We drove away Monday morning, leaving her with my parents, she wanted to spend a few days with them, and they'll drop her off for new student orientation. We had to get Ethan back to school... And now we are adjusting to missing her. What a huge hole such a little girl can leave. Thanksgiving can't come soon enough.

I'm so blessed to have been her momma for the 18+ years (yes, I know I'm still her momma, it's just a bit different without her here). It's been nearly perfect, we have a really good family life, something I was promised a long time ago. I was talking to Kelly about how we got married because we really liked each other, then we got two awesome kids as a bonus, and now Annie will be spreading her wings, closely followed by Ethan, which means it will be just Kelly and me again. It's a good thing we still really like each other. The thing I didn't realize when I became a mother was just how much of a bonus my kids would be for our family unit. Makes it hard when they start to leave, but how great it's been! 

So here we are, checking our phones for texts far too often than I care to admit. And enjoying every single minute of the next three years we have with Ethan. It goes way too fast.

She promised to send me pictures of her first day. 

I had to finish up my Cocoa Daisy work before we left, I was a little melancholy, so two of the three designs are based on Annie. They make me smile. I ended up really liking the kit, it was hard to get into, but once I got going it really worked well for me. :)

Reveal of 5th & Main is tomorrow at 9 EST. Christine has a special offer for her 3rd anniversary, it's really a good time to be at Cocoa Daisy. Join us!