Halsey visit!

Our place feels empty again now that Byron's fam (mom, dad, and Joan) has departed after spending a fun-filled weekend with us in central Illinois.  Well, it was all fun-filled for us, but I don't think the beginning was quite so fun for them.  Their flight from Baltimore to Chicago was delayed by four hours due to weather, causing them to miss their connecting flight to Peoria.  They spent midnight Friday to six a.m. Saturday in a hotel in Chicago (which was covered in confetti because of the prom that had been held that night at the Holiday Inn Express...classy), and got to our house 10 1/2 hours later than planned...on Saturday morning rather than Friday evening.  Of course airlines don't provide any compensation for delays or missed flights if it's due to weather.  Travel in the midwest can be rough.  We were very, very happy when they finally arrived and expected them to be exhausted after their airport adventures, but surprisingly they were rearing to go and we headed out to Springfield shortly after they arrived.  We spent all day Saturday in the state's capitol city learning about Lincoln.  We went to the Lincoln Presidential Museum, Lincoln's house, the old Capitol Building, and the Lincoln and Herndon law firm, which unfortunately wasn't all that well maintained.  It was very clear that the Feds have the real money for the National Park Service and the state historical sites are operating on a much more meager budget.  It was a great day in Springfield (we've been wanting to go for a long time) and so much fun to spend time with family.  On Sunday we were happy to introduce the missionaries to our "investigator friends" (according to Byron dad was a CAT welder, Joan was his daughter, and mom was his girlfriend) and impress them by fulfilling our member missionary duties.  Okay, so Joan didn't let us actually follow through with that plan, but it was a good idea.  We had an absolutely wonderful time with them here and were sad to see them go, but we'll be excited to see them again in a few months when the baby finally arrives.  It's so fun to be with family!