abilene.

Any time spent with friends is just good for this momma's soul. And I am blessed to have many special friends that fill that need for me. (And blessed to have a husband that understands and encourages that need!) 

This day was so good for my soul. Danielle and Gina and our families are always "doing life together." (I love when Danielle says that!) I couldn't pick two better families to do life with, either. But this was different. This day was just the mommas. None of our 10 kids were invited to this little get together! 

We started with breakfast... 

Danielle's muffins and Gina's zucchini quiche were both delicious!! 

We started our road trip back to my hometown and had made it almost halfway when we had a little glitch. Warning lights... things dinging and beeping at us... a/c going out... power steering failing... minor problems for 3 women in a mini-van on a 100* day... 10 miles away from the closest town.

So we made our first unexpected stop... but they didn't want to couldn't help us. But they told us where to go... (that sounds bad... he was actually very nice about it.)

He sent us here... (where we wandered all through the shop yelling "Hello! Hello? Hello...")

American Pickers would have loved this guy. Seriously. He told us he has 3 houses full of antiques. 

This guy may not look like a knight in shining armor, but he totally was. He literally dropped what he was doing and came to our rescue. Even called a friend from a nearby town to bring us the belt that we needed. (And laughed at us taking pictures all over his shop, posing out front and leaving him leftover muffins. I can't imagine the stories he had for his wife when he got home that night!)

We were having lots of fun just hanging out with this guy in front of his shop...

taking pictures...

(pretty good for a camera on self timer sitting on top of a parked truck...)

and texting our husbands...

For the record, only 1 husband offered to come help us. (Props to you, Corey!) My favorite response was Ryan saying something like, "I'm sure you're all making the most of it.") =)

Once we heard he was waiting on a belt from another town, we took Davy up on his suggestion to hang out here. (He may have just been trying to get us away from his shop...) We relaxed in the air conditioning with Dr. Pepper and iced tea until Davy strolled across the street to tell us he was done. (Then Danielle threatened to get in a fight with me if I tried one more time to pay the bill. She's fiesty like that.) =)

An hour? An hour and a half later? We were back on the road and finished the last half of our journey to Abilene. Our first stop was meeting an old friend to do some jewelry shopping. (She's not old... I've just known her a long time.)

More details about this super cute stuff will be coming soon! Maybe even something like a give-away!

Lunch was amazing. Danielle and I had been craving the amazing grilled cheese sandwiches we had here after we took the girls to camp. This wasn't exactly on the menu (but it was close!) but she indulged us and wrote down our order as an "ooey-gooey grilled cheese sandwich with tomatoes." Yum!

Shopping... browsing... more shopping... a quick stop to see my Dad at his vet clinic (and buy flea meds. Stupid fleas)... Sonic... a quick stop to say hi to my mom... and we were headed back home.

Danielle's post about our trip is hilarious. You can read it here. 
And I loved her part about the last few miles. We did start talking faster... realizing our time was almost up! You would think that 9 1/2 hours together would be enough time to cover everything, but nope. It wasn't. I think we need at least a couple more days. =)