Finale Week

Almost a week ago, my dear friend, Claire and her cute family moved back to the U.S. Have a I told you about Claire? You might recall me mentioning her a few (a lot) of times on this blog. But have I ever told you about our story? No? Well then, pull up a chair.



Claire and I pretty much grew up as neighbors. She in Bear River City, and myself in Tremonton. (Both are two very small towns next to each other in Northern Utah). However, since she attended a different high school than me and is a couple of years younger than myself, our paths never crossed. As years passed and life took both of our husbands to the same MBA program at BYU, it wasn't until both of them were doing internships for the same company in New York City that we finally met. After being introduced at dinner by some mutual acquaintances, we had our first official playdate in Central Park.


Back in Provo we started running together and even ran the Utah Valley Half Marathon together (my first 1/2 marathon, her twentieth or something). After our husbands graduated, we sadly had to part ways. They went to Pheonix. We went to New Jersey.



After living in Jersey for about a year, we started thinking about Phil's international rotation coming up. Right around the time we were planning on it being Australia, Claire told me Nate (her husband) was going to be doing a rotatation there as well! And so they ended up arriving to Sydney about 5 months before us. Aside from feeling excited to hang out with Claire and her cute kids again, this phase of our friendship was nothing less than a blessing. An international move can be hard. But we got to do it with friends already put perfectly in place. Nate helped us find our housing, Claire answered my ba-zillion questions, they also picked us up from the airport upon after a 20-something hour long trip over here...I could go on. Point is, transitioning into our new life here was so much easier because of them.

 Although the love was definity there...Owen and Hazel's relationship was complicated... :)

How blessed I have been to  have my small-town friend "conveniently" there through our family's big city adventures.

Alas, all good things must come to an end. Claire and Nate will be moving back to Pheonix and we'll be going our different ways once more. But given our history, I have no doubt that they'll cross again. Plus, it doesn't hurt one bit to have parents that live within 8 miles of each other.

Everywhere we went Claire would get strangers commenting on her children's beautiful blonde hair and blue eyes...

...mine would get other types of comments

Of course, knowing their departure was fast approaching, we made sure to make the most of their last week here.  We walked down to Balmoral Beach. One day we went into the city and went to Paddy's Market, played around Darling Harbor and then met the boys for lunch at Hurricanes. And of course, one last and final run to the Zoo with a little Chargrilled Charlies for lunch. All of our favorites crammed into one week--hence, our "Finale Week".

Norah, Ryder and Penny all looking at their zoo maps together in their matching Aussie hoodies they got from Paddy's the day before. This wasn't staged nor was the wardrobe planned!

 

Until next time, sweet friend!