Our family lives in North Carolina....

so we're on the road a lot.  Luckily, they are only about an hour apart from each other.  If I've said this once, I've said it a million times.

I've shared multiple times about our families living in NC.  A large group of our friends still live there too.  Travel is just a part of our life.  We're used to it and we've got it down to a science.  Yes we travel a lot!  The four week stretch in August and September may have taken the spot of 1st place in our travel books from the past 4 years (not counting holiday travels....they are a book of their own!).   We used to travel all the time - with 2 boys, we've cut back A LOT - but this summer we were on the go a lot.  Always fun but always a little exhausting at the same time....especially on Monday morning!

The last weekend in August, we headed to see Chad's family in NC.  We were so happy to be able to get home for Addie's birthday party.  She was turning 2 - unfortunately, we missed her 1st birthday because we were in Disney at this time last year.  It is always great to be home and we were able to see the majority of Chad's family - his mom had most of the family over on Friday night and the party was Saturday afternoon so we were able to see the other's who we hadn't seen on Friday.    

Payton loves a good birthday party and of course, wanted to get Addie a t-ball set (this is his standard, go to present for anyone have a party - boy or girl!).  

Everyone (including Aunt Chandra....holding Owen) enjoyed Addie's birthday present - a brand new swing set!

Addie and Payton on the slide.

Addie (with a little help from Payton!) blowing out the candles on her cake.  It was a Toy Story themed party and the cake was cute!  The colored balls at the bottom of the cake were gum balls....just in case you ever need an easy DIY cake project!

Carson and Owen on a super cute pink piano!

We had a great time with Chad's family and celebrating with Addie.

Unfortunately, this was the same weekend that we got the sad news about my cousin's fiancee - we left to be with my cousin on Sunday morning and spent the afternoon in SF.  I did not want to leave at the end of the day but Chad finally got me in the car and we headed home around 7:30 pm....which put us home around midnight...on a work night....blah.

Road trip #1 was a success!