Family Travels

On the morning of November 16th, my family and Dad's brother (Jim) headed out of Texas. Our trip to Atlanta for the National Missionary Convention had finally begun! Being that it was a two day trip, we stayed the first night in Birmingham, Alabama, with Mr. and Mrs. L., a very sweet couple! Mr. and Mrs. L.  have been to my Uncle Jim's church in Germany. They were very gracious hosts and made really good food! ;) Our ministry had a booth there, as did Uncle Jim. Enjoy!!

Mrs. and Mr. L. with Uncle Jim

Home school field trip to the lab where Mr. L. works

Then we had a very delicious lunch at the above Japanese restaurant! :)  I got a scrumptious dish of teriyaki chicken with fried rice. As a side note, Mrs. L. works at Shonos. And in case you were wondering, the L.'s are not Japanese, they are Chinese.

The lovely grand piano at the H's home. They were our hosts in Atlanta.

I just couldn't pass up the opportunity to play on the H.'s piano. :)

Phoebe

The H.'s dog-- aptly named "Sugar" :)

As you can tell, we had a very lovely house to stay in!

Beauty

A sweet German young lady (Rahel), who stopped by Uncle Jim's booth.

My dear friend, Kimberly and myself. I met Kimberly a year ago at an Answers in Genesis conference in Tennessee. She came to see us in Atlanta, with her Dad and her sister. :)

Kimberly's sister, Neyland and myself

Kautt and Huddle girls

Later that day (Saturday) the dear Munck family came to see us. We met the Muncks through their blog and we girls have corresponded with their girls, so it was a treat to meet them in person!! :)

 Abby with Mary Ann Munck (don't you love Abby's smile??)

The Munck sisters: Ruth Ella, Amanda, Rebekah, Mary Ann, Elizabeth.

Yours-truly with little miss Mary Ann -- she was the star of the show. :)

Mrs. Munck and Mom

The boys and Ruth Ella, playing "monkey in the middle" (ha!)

Mr. Munck and Dad

All of the girls. L-R: Phoebe, Mandy, Mary Ann (sleeping), yours-truly, Bekah, Ruth Ella, Lizzy, Abby. :)

The whole Munck clan. L-R (Back row): Madison, Elizabeth, Mr. and Mrs. Munck, Rebekah, Mary Ann and Amanda. Front row: James, Jonathan, William, Wesley, Ruth Ella and Stephen. :)

A lovely, handmade yo-yo "quilt" at the H.'s house

Art

Kudzoo! :)

The old Vicksburg (Mississippi) courthouse

Old Glory

The holly and the ivy...

The Kautts in Vicksburg -- at this point, Uncle Jim was not with us, because he had flown back to Germany from Atlanta. This was on our way back to TX. 

In Vicksburg, we got to see this old ship (the USS Cairo) that the Unions used during the Civil War. It was sunk in the year 1860, then in 1962 it was brought up out of the Mississippi river. Most of the original wood framework is gone or rotten so they made a new wooden framework for it. The big metal wheel (in the center of the photo) was crushed in a heap when they found it, but with much patience they restored it to a working condition.

Yours-truly in front of a lovely old house :)

The back of the above house

The large cemetery of many Civil war soldiers. It was very sobering and saddening to see so many graves. And a numerous amount of the headstones were marked with just a number because it was too difficult to trace some of the dead to their names and families. 

Our trip was a nice one, but we were very glad to be back in Texas!!! :)