Happy Father’s Day to the very best Dads in the whole world!
One of the most exciting events of this spring was the arrival of
Brooke Olivia Spitler
She was born April 2, and we couldn’t wait to get up to PA to meet her for the first time. She is our kids’ very first cousin on the Noll side, and we obviously love having another little girl in the family.
We love it so much we just had to do a super girly thing for our first time getting this feminine brood together:
(Grammy and Grandpa’s two littlest girls)
I tried my hand at Tu-tu making…
and we came away with tu-tu cute photos of the newest generation in the Noll clan. It was tu-tu much fun, having all this girliness…
and having it FOUR-fold!
Oh boy girl! What fun we have in store when they are all teenagers! 
(For more sweet photos of this fun day and others from our first visit with Brooke, you can visit her family’s blog here.)
*photo compliments of Martha Noll Photography
In March our family was super excited to welcome Aunt Karyn to Orlando. Karyn has been living in Germany since last September, and she’s not sure yet when she’ll be moving back to the States, so this visit was a big treat. She came for 5 days and we soaked up every minute of our time with her.
Though we couldn’t go to any of the amusement parks, we did enjoy an evening at citywalk. Noa and Martha hadn’t been before either, so it was a treat for them too. 
Karyn bunked in the girls’ room, and found herself with cuddly bed buddies every morning.
The girls LOVED having such a fun roomie…
And all sophisticated young ladies need a proper tea party in their first waking moments, right?
One day we went to Blue Spring to see the Manatees. We always love going to Blue Spring, but it was even more fun with Aunt Karyn.
It was also exciting to get to show her a real gator. It sort of completes any visit to Florida, ya know?
It was SO special to have Karyn with us, to get to show her parts of our life in Florida, and to enjoy her sweet company. I especially loved our many conversations and am thankful for the way the Lord uses this beautiful woman of faith to challenge and encourage me.
THANK YOU, Karyn, for making our home a stop on your visit. We treasure our memories with you and can’t wait til next time we get to hang out!
To read about Karyn’s exciting life in Germany, visit her blog.
*We are settled in Waynesboro and I am hoping to start my catch-up blogging. Here’s the first installment – photos from our fabulous Christmas with Grammy and Grandpa (Noll) down from PA.
This one (above) is one of my all-time favorites! And (below), we even got to see Grandma and Grandpa Kuehn in St. Augustine during their visit!
What a special Christmas! We know we probably won’t get to host our family for holidays much once we move to South Asia, so this year was truly special.
Thank you so much, Grammy and Grandpa, for coming and making it such a special Christmas!
One day when Mom and Dad Noll were here, we really wanted to get a good photo of them with the girls. We tried several times, and finally came up with a keeper. I thought you’d like to see what we went through with Martha to get it, though:
She was getting the “smile” part, but she just couldn’t stop dancing…
and finally, the one we were waiting for:
I have so many wonderful memories that I have wanted to share here but there just doesn’t seem to be enough time in the days to do it. I still have lofty goals, though, and I figure I can at least share photos. Here’s some from our AMAZING vacation with our Noll family this summer. Eric took a week off of work (something he hasn’t been able to do in I don’t know how long), and we spent some time in PA but most of the time at the Shore in New Jersey. It was an incredible time of rest and restoration for us, as well as being a really sweet time with most of our Noll family (though we only briefly crossed paths with Laura and Clayt in PA 
). Enjoy the photos!
