We had a great visit.....

We live about an hour and a half away from Brother and his family but hardly ever see them, except for weddings.  We will go to one of his children's weddings at the drop of a hat.  Or a wedding veil.  We try to celebrate the milestones like birthdays and anniversaries with a card or a call or a belated wish.  Most often, mine fall into the latter category. 

Ron has been saying that he wanted to try and meet us for lunch one of these days and on the 18th of the month, we all made it to Cracker Barrel.  Well, all but Tom.  I got out of work to see Ron and Alicia for lunch and a stroll around the gift shop. 

Afterwards, I thought to myself - why not all go to the house and visit with T.  All it took was a phone call to my boss to ask if I could take the rest of the day off and to my amusement, the Lieutenant didn't say to go ahead and take the time.  He asked me WHAT DID YOU DO WITH MRS. VINING!  Then, he said yes, of course - take the rest of the day.  See ya tomorrow. 

We had a nice long visit and I thoroughly enjoyed being with Ron and Alicia.  Rain clouds gathered and Ron said they had to get home to allow their dog out into the yard.  She was in the house and I guess older kidneys can't take the strain as well as a younger pup's can.  Isn't that true of us all?  As we gathered on the porch for group shots of the family (Rich, Nathan, Matthew, Tommy, Ron, Alicia and me - available on Alicia's Facebook page in the Lake City visit album) I snapped off a shot of Brother.  You will notice the eyes are shut and a slight grin lights the lips.  Other than that little flaw, it's a good picture for an image taken with a cell phone.  There is a fix, though.  Take a brown marker and make two dots on the eyelids and imagine how nice a picture this could have been, save for the one slight glitch.  Why does he DO that!

'Cause he can.

Alicia was a much easier subject as she stood in the yard checking her camera images - I sort of snuck around behind Ron and Rich and took a quick picture.  And she didn't close her eyes.  Perhaps that's the way to take Ron's photograph next time.  Sneak it in!