Bill, Jill, and Ben!

Bill and I had been looking forward to his visit for weeks. It wasn't his fault that his family arrived the day of Kitsune's death. We were supposed to meet up on Sunday, but I spent the most of the day with Carrie trailering Eowyn and supporting her as she processed.

However, I reminded Carrie that Bill was in town and she sent me off to see them. I'd hoped to have them come by the farm, meet Loki, see the house (and introduce Ben to Kitsune...), but that was out of the question now. Carrie didn't want anyone coming by the house. 

So, I drove in to town.

I'd been trading texts with Bill to give him updates all day. I'd recommended they walk the Blue Ridge Tunnel and that turned out to be a big hit with Ben. They'd gone for a ride on Skyline Drive, got caught in a storm, and did other fun things to fill their time in the day. 

For dinner, we met up at the Dairy Market. Jill got ramen, but Bill wanted to try out a new place I hadn't seen before. 

I would've tried it, too, if they hadn't sold out of what I wanted! It felt like they were still figuring things out (The soda machine didn't work, they were out of items, etc). I parked with Ben while Bill tried to make sure his order got right.

Ben was happy to see Bill! He goes back and forth between being a Mommy's boy or a Daddy's dude.

Bill and I both grew up in homes where our dads were involved and it shows in our parenting styles (The stereotype of the uninvolved dad applied even less to Jerry as he single parented for a while!).

We ate and talked away. Bill started talking about how wonderful Charlottesville was and it'd be nice to move there. I thought he was joking until I noticed Jill's serious face! He went through a list of all the perks, but was also aware he'd need a lot of things to go right for it to be feasible. I didn't want to get his (or my) hopes up too high, but it would be awesome having Bill nearby (I just don't see it happening).

After dinner, we went on walk to digest and explore a little. There was a hoop game that Benny wanted to play.

Jill started off holding him up to play, but then jumped in and beat their score.

I don't know if that made Ben want to switch to the winning side or if it activated Jill's competitive gene, but Ben ended up with Bill next!

I'd been too busy talking to take many pictures, but I grabbed a few small videos here.

I pulled out what I thought the best screen captures were and sent them to Jill later.

They certainly looked like they were having fun!

We got ice cream from Moo Through afterward. I felt a little bad when Bill bought my cone after I hadn't been available all day, but appreciated it nonetheless. I'd warned them that the cones were big and Bill had significantly underestimated what two scoops for Ben would look like! Jill laughed, because she'd ordered nothing and ended up with all the ice cream she wanted from Bill and Ben!

We played outside for a little bit before driving over to a local park. Ben played and Jill ended up becoming a playground mom as a couple other kids started to interact with her at the end.

I would've loved to stayed and talked longer, but I was worried about Carrie. I didn't want to leave her alone too long when I knew she was feeling depressed. I said my goodbyes and headed home to end the night. 

I wish we'd had more time and I'd gotten to show off the farm, but I was glad to see Bill's family at all! They continued on the road to Tennessee the following morning. They were going to see the Great Smokey Mountains (and glamp a little bit!).