Dear Mississippi

Dear Mississippi,

Thanks for a great year.  We loved living in your state.  We planned on calling Mississippi home for several years, but God had other plans for our family.  We met so many nice people and had such a great time exploring.  We miss all the Southern hospitality and we miss your friendly people.  Grocery shopping just isn't the same in Indiana.  People in the South talk to everyone in the store and you feel like you make all kinds of friends.  People are generous with their God bless yous and have a blessed day.  They smile, make eye contact and are usually up for a good chat.

We miss...
our house
our backyard
our favorite restaurants
Daylight Donuts
our church and all of their programs
fancy dresses every week at church
all the y'alls
magnolia trees
crepe myrtle lined streets
spanish moss
southern hospitality where everyone talks and visits with everyone
bible studies
our friends
the children's museum
Target
being just a few hours from the beach
SEC football excitement and enthusiasm
fancy tailgating
smocked dresses
big bows
monograms

We also miss Maybelle.  

(These pictures were taken during our last hours in Mississippi.  I'd been packing and sweating for DAYS and Maybelle stopped by looking classy as ever.  Olive is in her pjs and seemed like she knew we were really saying goodbye.)

I know I mentioned Maybelle regularly and we really do miss her.  Olive thinks she still lives next door and when we baked cookies last weekend she asked if they were "for Belle-Belle?"  We always baked and made food to deliver next door and enjoying going over to Maybelle's house for a visit.  She was excited to have us as neighbors and loved inviting us over.  We'd go over for a visit and she'd always have special snacks for Olive.  She'd buy different sugary cereals and have cups just for her.  Olive knew where she kept everything and they had a sweet little routine down.  Maybelle let Olive pretend to sleep on her guest bed, open cabinets and make herself right at home.

She was the perfect Southern belle with the most perfect Southern accent.  She was in her 70s and kept busier than most people I know with choir, work with the bed and breakfast association, traveling and visiting her family.  We enjoyed her company.  She had two sons and seemed to love hanging out with us girls.  We'd go out to lunch on Saturdays, go to the Christmas market and she'd bring us soup if she knew we were sick.  She was feisty and definitely kept our little cul-de-sac in ship shape condition.  She invited us to church and to any social function that was going on.  She dropped off newspaper clippings and flagged magazines to our door so we'd know about the family friendly activities going on in her state.  She was a fun neighbor and I hope we can do a good job of staying in touch.


We will always smile when we think of Mississippi and hope to get back for a visit in the near future.  We're thankful our house sold so quickly, but definitely miss the life we'd established there.  We are also so thankful that Mississippi had a Burn Center so close to Jackson.  I'm still sad that we ever had to use their services, but am so appreciative of how they helped Olive recover from her burn.


It seems to take close to a year for a place to feel like home.  We are settling in nicely to our life in Indiana, but we are still at the awkward stage of everything being so new.  We lived in Southern IN for the first 20 years of our life and now we are living in Central IN.  Same state, but definitely a new to us city.  We are loving the weather and I think we are really going to enjoy having a true fall/winter again.  We are working hard to make work/couple/mom/kid friends, establish routines and find a church.  It's all a bit exhausting and takes a ton of effort on our part.  Everything is good and all of our efforts will be well worth it, but it's still our third new city in three years and it takes time for everything to feel homey.


Wish us luck & go visit Mississippi if you ever  have the chance!!
We sure loved it :)