Homeward bound! We headed to
Raleigh, North Carolina on Wednesday afternoon and couldn’t be more excited
about it. We took home a total of 4
suitcases but out smarted American Airlines by packing 2 suitcases in one suitcase!
Smart thinking on our part? I’d say so! We first had to fly through Miami. Which, by the way was awful! If I had known that we would have to walk 13
miles to get to a first custom check point. Oh and it didn’t end there! We had
2 more custom check points as if the 1st and 2nd weren’t
enough! We walked 10 miles after that until we found a Chili’s. Had I known we were about to walk a marathon
I would have worn sneakers instead! Having not had fine American cuisine for 4
months the Chili’s was in fact mouthwatering.
I guess it goes without saying that we cleared our plates that night.
Raleigh
bound we were and couldn’t be happier about it.
Our flight went as most flights do, uneventful (I’m not
complaining!). Side note: My mom always
says she would like to sit next to the little box on all her flights because if
the plane was to crash, they always find the little black box, thus they will
find her! Oh Katfish! Anyway finally home.
We landed in good ole Carolina! My parents had planned to pick us up so
I knew to be on the lookout for them once through terminal but our sweet
surprise both our families were there! Complete with siblings! It was so
touching to have everyone be there to greet us and welcome us HOME! We are so
blessed to have the families that we do.
Thank you all for being there, it meant so much to us. As if our families being there wasn’t enough!
Duke was waiting patiently in the car for us as well! Duke Duke was tired and
didn’t give us the grand welcome we had expected but was still excited
nonetheless. Oh and for the icing on the
cake! Two sweet teas ready to be sipped were given to us by Daniel and Michael
(Andrew’s brothers). Sweet tea never
tasted so sweet!
We must
waste no time! Thursday morning came and was filled with a few dentist and
doctor appointments and eating of course! Also I was able to go out and see my
sweet Sissy and Will. No I did not get
the grand stampede that I had envisioned but more of a “oh it’s you…” instead!
But that was fine because I didn’t care all I wanted to do was love on them and
they let me as long as the carrots and peppermints were plentiful! Sissy looked
great, so I thought; Daniel on the other hand didn’t seem to agree! I said
something like “Sissy looks soo good! Doesn’t she? Especially since she just
turned 32!” Daniel then said something like...”32? Looks more like 100!” Oh
Daniel! So she was little dirty…but we took care of that. Being back at the barn with the horses was so
nice; it’s good for the soul I think.
Wasting no time we had made plans to have dinner with our friends
and family Thursday night at one of most favorite restaurants in Raleigh,
Centro( Dos Taquitos Centro). It was
such a delightful evening! It was a night full of good food, wonderful
margaritas, and incredible fellowship.
Thank you to Centro for letting us share such a wonderful night with
you, it was so special. And thank you to
all of our friends and family for being there with us, you mean so much to
us. We are blessed beyond words. We ate, drank a little or a lot! And enjoyed each
other’s company most importantly. What an amazing night! Oh and secret! I
stopped at KrispyKreme on the way home and got a cream filled doughnut! Shhhh!
It was soo delicious!
Friday came quickly! Mom and I
started our Friday with a quick stop at Chick-Fila for some buttered biscuits,
hash browns and sweet tea before heading to the spa! Dad, Andrew, Michael and
Daniel headed on down to the coast to ready the boat for the weekend. Mom and I took our time at the spa and had
facials and pedicures! Which were both extremely necessary! After that we too headed to the beach to join
the boys. But we took the liberty of
doing a little shopping first! We clearly were in no hurry to arrive! Andrews’s
parents and sister joined us later Friday evening as well! What a treat! So we geared up for a fun
weekend. We spent the whole day out on
the salty sea Saturday. Though we didn’t
hook up with any big fish we all still had a great time! I even drove the boat
a little! I have a picture as poof! My sweet dear friend, Justine and her
amazing fiancé Eric even joined us for the rest of weekend too! We had such a
great long weekend down at the coast and cherished our time with family and
friends so much! We boated (or yachting as Katfish says), fished and enjoyed
good company the whole weekend!
Back to Raleigh we headed after a
nice long weekend at the coast to spend a few more days there before heading
down to Lexington. I spent the next few
days in Raleigh soaking up my time with Sissy and Will. It is amazing how good a horse can look when
you brush them 5 days in a row!
We continued our food
crawl through Raleigh while we were still there. If it wasn’t nailed down we were eating it!
Oh and errand galore! We ran to Target about 300 times. Just so you know, St. Kitts doesn’t have a
Target and I adore everything from Target, so it was absolutely necessary that
I spend hours in Target looking at things! I love things!
We wrapped up our time in Raleigh by spending time with my
parents, brother, friends, and of course Sissy and Will. I loved on Sissy until she wouldn’t let me
love on her anymore, which was really long time! As our time in Raleigh came to
an end…it was time to leave the BIG city and head to the country! We headed
down the road, excited about what Lexington had in store for us! Oh something
great! We shopped along the way! Who loves outlet shopping? I do! Only a few
stores though….
Once in Lexington we knew we could rather relax! Raleigh was
so busy! Between all of our Target runs and all…Andrew’s parents were having a Ranch
Horse Show with Ricky and Nancy Johnson down at the Johnson Ranch on Saturday,
so naturally were we excited. My butt
didn’t leave a saddle that day if it didn’t have to! Also my toes had missed my
boots something awful! The show had an
incredible turn out and was a lot of fun! Our friends Justin and Kara even came
up for the day to hang out and ride with us! What a treat it was! We were able
to share Justin’s birthday with them! We all had a blast! Oh and this team sorting thing I could get
into. So the ranch horse shows are
pretty awesome and are full of lots of calf cutting, no not really cutting
cows, youtube it you’ll see. Hey Cow! Hey Cow! Andrew and Justin even took home
money and won their team sorting class.
What an awesome day.
Sunday came and we had a nice
church service and then had family over to visit afterwards. Nothing like good ole front porch sittin’ on
a North Carolina farm! Back to the
Johnson Ranch we went for some more riding Sunday evening. Thank you again Ricky and Nancy! We had a
blast!
Well our days went too quickly in Lexington even though we
were supposed to be relaxing we still managed to fill our days. Mostly we were
just horsin’ around! We spent time
with family and ate…a lot…Oh and Andrew even got to help his Dad castrate a few
of their yearlings! What a privilege!
My Dad and brother, Matt, even came up mid-week for
visit. It was so nice having them. We had these grand plans of shooting skeet
but instead we all just sat on the porch and chitchatted. Which I would not have traded for the world!
Needless to say we had sweet teas in hand!
Friday night came too quickly, our
last night in North Carolina. But we
were able to have our families there with us.
It was so nice to have everyone together before we headed back to the
rock that we call home now. The evening was bittersweet. Bitter because we knew we were leaving
tomorrow and sweet because we had what was most important to us with us. Saturday came and we said good bye…Everyone was
there to wave us off and wave us off they did! Like 500 times! Tears flowed,
hugs were given, and prayers were said.
Gosh I can’t get over what an incredible time we had at home. It was good for our souls to get back to our
roots. Though our rock is home for the
next few years we know where our hearts belong.
Raleigh List:
Tuscan Blue
The Draft House
Moe's
Morehead City list:
Circa 81
El's Drive In
Fish Tales
Jersey Mikes
Coldstone
Lexington List:
