Our Departure

Even though we've had several departures from the Little Rock Airport by this point in our lives, the one on January 20th, 2007 had quite the unique twist!

My cousin, Karol Guthrie, and her family were leaving the same day to fly to Italy where they would be living for 3 years. Karol's husband, Kevin, is a chaplain in the US Army and they will be living just outside of Venice.

How odd that we ended up flying out of the same airport on the same day? With all our family combined, it was the largest send-off we've ever had!

I don't know if you can tell from the picture, but we were on the 1:00 flight to Dallas and they were on the 2:35 flight to Baltimore.

Allens + Guthries + lots of Reddins!

The girl cousins

The boy cousins

Not sure what the kids were doing here. I'd like to think they were praying, but my motherly instinct tells me otherwise!

Kaylee and Carly get one last chance for some girl talk! Maybe they were talking about Italy and the Philippines?!

Getting in one last hug with Mamaw

And one last hug from Minnie

And who can forget our crazy Uncle Sam?!

Caleb takes one long, last drink at the water fountain!

All those good-byes are tiring!

After 30 plus hours in airplanes or airports, we FINALLY arrived back in Manila. We enjoyed a couple of nights in a hotel before getting back to all we needed to do in Legazpi. We so enjoyed the few weeks we had in the States. It really helped us to be prepared to come back to the Philippines and minister to so many here.