Big Brother, Little Brother

I am standing in the dark of the hotel room on my phone constructing this post, while I wait for my fair turn in the bathroom. We had an excellent 15 hour trip down; we brought Alyssa (because she isn't home for Gabriel's home coming and wedding this summer) and Elijah (because he misses his brother so). I felt very good about the care-giver line-up that I left with the children at home but did receive bad news that Selah and Bella have spent most of the evening crying for me. This is the first time I have left them overnight in the six months they have been home! I really agonized about it and felt like it was the right thing to come to FL, especially in light of Gabriel's orders to the west coast where we will not see him regularly.

Since a picture is worth a thousand words, let me show you Elijah with his biggest brother that he so misses.

And here's Elijah in his early birthday present from Gabriel - a matching Navy uniform with his name on it!