How to Make a House with 8 People in It Feel Empty

It's simple really: all you have to do is have a family of 7 people spend the weekend with you; and after a couple days of the house being FULL of laughter and noise and bodies and activity with all 15 of you there, by Monday when your friends drive away, a house of only 8 people will indeed feel empty!

The friends who were here have been featured on the blog before, so if you've read for a while, they might look familiar.  I'm so grateful that they continue to make the trek here from their home in North Carolina to spend time with us!!  :)

I wasn't very systematic with my picture-taking during this visit; and of course, it wasn't until it was too late that I thought how nice it would have been to have gotten a group photo of all of us.  Maybe the next time they come, I'll remember in time?  :)

Regardless, here are a few random shots of some of the fun we had together this past weekend.  :)

As soon as they got here, a light saber fight was organized.

 David and Tobin have been accumulating Pokemon cards and were excited to play with that with Aidan who has quite an extensive collection of them.

 We shared meals together around our long kitchen table (one of my very favorite pieces of furniture that we have).

 Target practice was a lot of fun.  :)

 As is customary, my parents joined us for Sunday dinner after church; I'm always glad when they can be here for that!  I happened to catch my dad when he was blinking; he is not, in fact, asleep as he appears.  ;-)

 Our weather has been unusually warm for December.  Some folks around here feel that it sure doesn't feel like Christmas with such mild weather; but as far as I'm concerned, the warm weather came at a perfect time so that lots of outdoor activities could be done this weekend.  When the noise level got too high inside the house, we could "encourage" the kids to go outside for a change.  Not that these two pictured below, Kiara and Josiah, were the noisy ones...

 Sunday evening, the game closet got raided...

 ...and various members of the group played Spoons...

 ...and Candyland (Shav was really a sweetheart, playing this with Moriah and Caitlyn)...

 ...and Settlers of Catan.

 Embre saw her mommy holding Benjamin and let it be known that she didn't like that one bit!  ;-)  But she was glad to get to hold Benjamin herself.  :)

 Moriah and Caitlyn are still at the stage of often doing "parallel play," rather than truly interacting a lot with each other.  But they're beginning to change that, and I enjoyed watching them have fun together.  I can picture them, in years to come, having a blast together.  :)

 One of the last activities, right before they hit the road, was more target practice.  :)

And then, after lots of goodbyes and hugs and "come again's", our friends piled into their van and pulled out of the driveway, leaving behind a house that felt suddenly big and empty.

Eight people are not as many as I thought they were.  ;-)