Hello...and goodbye

I was incredibly blessed on Monday to finally meet the NICEST most FABULOUS woman in the world!  After years of connecting through social networks only, we were able to meet in person at my home for the first time ever in real life!!!!

Tonya is her name, and she is a doll!  I love her honesty and her sincerity, but I am most blessed by her love of the Lord and her willingness to share her faith and her heart with people that she's never even met in real life (like me!).  She has been quick to pray for me and each member of my family over the years after receiving one of my tweets, status updates or blog posts.   I am so honored by her support....she has been a light to my path on more than one occasion!

And not only is she great, but (no surprise!) she also has a wonderful family!

It was so fun to meet the people I've been reading about for so long, and they were just as I had imagined ;D

You may be wondering what brought us together after all this time, and it's kind of a funny story.  If you've been reading my blog for a while, then you have probably heard about our beloved old red wagon!  We got the wagon back in October, and after lots of paint and a few new nails, we've been able to enjoy it on several occasions.  When we initially bought it, we were determined to take it with us when and if we ever moved, but now that we know we're moving, we realize it's just not possible to take it with us.  It's great to pull behind a vehicle going about 20mph, but I don't think it would survive the 14hr trip to Georgia :D

A few days before Christmas, we took the Gang out for an evening ride in our wagon, enjoying the Christmas lights and singing Christmas carols while we drove.  I posted about how it would be our last time using the wagon, but I didn't mention that we had actually put it on Craigslist to try to find a new home for it.  A few days after my blog post, I received a message on Facebook from Tonya asking if I would consider selling the wagon to her family.....

I was ecstatic!!!  I couldn't believe someone I knew would actually want our old red wagon, and for it to be Tonya just made it even better!!!  I messaged her that I would love for them to have it if they could figure out a way to get it back to their home.  I knew she lived far enough away that the wagon would not make the trip on it's own and would need to be transported by a trailer.  When she told me they had access to a trailer and would love to make the trip to pick it up, I just knew it was meant to be!  And not only that, but it meant we would get the chance to meet :D

It was a date!  And on Monday, we met and spent a couple of hours hanging out and enjoying each other's families.  What a blessing!  Our husbands were able to roll that big old red wagon up onto the trailer and this is the last memory I will have of our beloved wagon.....

As hard as it is to see it go, I couldn't be MORE thrilled to know where it will land!  There is no doubt in my mind that Tonya and her family will enjoy it as much as the Gang did, and I look forward to seeing her post about their adventures on her blog ;D  And I will never forget that it was that same old wagon that gave me the opportunity to meet such an amazing woman!