Atlanta: Fourth of July and Friends

Whenever we visit Atlanta, we always try to visit Tha, one of David's oldest and dearest friends. Tha's family were Cambodian refugees who came to America when Tha was very young. They return to Cambodia every few years; Tha even married a girl from Cambodia in a big, traditional Cambodian wedding ceremony. (I've seen the pictures. It was gorgeous.)

Tha is an artist and put his artistic use to skill in order to become an architect. We went to his office in downtown Atlanta to visit him and get the grand tour of his company's beautiful new office, which included this amazing view of Atlanta. I don't know how much work I'd get done if I could stare out my window at this all day long.

Here's Tha with our silly Zara. We left Tha's office and drove out to East Point to meet Tha's wife and his two kids and ate dinner at a Vietnamese restaurant. Man, I love Asian food. So good. Tha was a very influential person in David's life so I always love any chance we get to see him.

Our last day in Atlanta was the Fourth of July. We had finally moved David's parents into their new home in Powder Springs, so they had the whole family over for steaks and pie. Zara was super excited to celebrate her first Fourth of July. (That's her cousin, Jackson, in the background.) It was fun to spend our last day in Georgia with all of David's family.

I don't why, but this face just cracks me up.

Here's Jackson again. David, as many of you know, has four sisters. Fiona is the oldest, then comes David, Sasha, Lorann, and Kristy. This is Sasha's third child. She's got another one on the way. I hope it's a girl because girls are seriously under-represented amongst the grandkids, much to my father-in-law's disappointment.

This is David's youngest sister, Kristy, with Zara and Jackson.
Here's part of the family relaxing in the new family room.

And here's more of David's family: his older sister Fiona and her husband Jeremy are in the background. And David's third sister, Lorann, and her husband Matt are playing with Zara. Lorann was very pregnant at the time. We missed the birth of her baby boy, Ryan, by about two weeks.

The cousins all had a great time playing with each other. Here are almost all of them (except for Fiona's two oldest who were in Florida with their dad for the summer.) From front to back is Jackson, Ashleigh, Cody, Zara, Nolan, and Makayla.

David's dad playing with Zara (who he calls Zoomy) and Jackson.


We all enjoyed our holiday meal. Afterward, we played cards with David's siblings and their spouses and then said our good-byes. I don't know when we'll get a chance to head out to Atlanta again, but the more time I spend out there, the more I like it.