Directly south of the "K" you'll see Grand Island. We are due west about 20 miles in a little town called Aurora. It's a town about the same size as the high school that I graduated from. In fact, every weekend at our church back home - GCC - we have about 1000 more people in attendance on any given weekend than live in this town. It's a wonderful place - very friendly people, and old-fashion town square with cute little shops all around it (including a decent scrapbook store and a coffee shop called "Espressions" - hehe!) We're staying at a very unusual place called "The Leadership Center" that's only about 2 blocks from my aunt & uncle's house. Jacob describes it as "the coolest hotel I've ever been to!" It's basically like staying at a YMCA with a hotel attached - and we have the whole place to ourselves for the whole week (with the exception of tonight, when they have 190 middle school students on a retreat - YIKES!!) They have a HUGE pool with a hot tub and sauna, a gym with basketball and volleyball, and a game room with ping pong and foosball. They also have a lobby-type area with a big-screen TV. We're becoming quite spoiled and I'm sure the kids will be forever ruined for hotel stays - they'll expect an olympic sized pool all to themselves everywhere we go from now on!

They and their cousins are having quite a time getting re-acquainted. They've just met Brayden, Alyssa and Kelby for the first time in at least two years, so they didn't really remember each other at all. They are all peas in a pod, and they spend all of their time following Kaitlyn around and fighting over who gets to sit next to their "cool, older" cousin. They've spent countless hours in the pool so far, getting water-logged and pruny, and jumping into the arms of anyone who's foolish enough to stand in the way and catch them. We've only lost one or two of them to the bottom of the pool - temporarily - on a couple of occasions. Unfortunately for the adults, the majority of the kids are completely fearless.

Tomorrow is the rehearsal/dinner and Saturday is the wedding - while ya'll are celebrating the New Year, we'll be here "dancing the night away" at Jeff and Faith's reception. Feel free to give us call at midnight - it's an hour earlier here than it is back home! Maybe we'll return the favor as the clock strikes here! ;) Sunday we hang out for the gift-opening, and Monday we head back home to the real world... Should have plenty of pictures to share once we get back. I'm sure you're all waiting on the edge of your seats to see what Nebraska looks like in December. I only wish I could share the SMELL with every one of you!!