Washington, DC – October 2014

PC: Greg Jones

Soooo, I know I’m posting this super late but better late than never, right?? I thought I would speak a little on the ways in which we got to Germany, and our adventures in DC before we took off on our grand European adventure. In order to make our way to Germany, we had to drive my car up to Baltimore, Maryland where it was shipped across the big blue ocean to the great Deutschland. Since, we had to stay a couple days in Baltimore before we flew to Germany, we decided to take a detour to Washington, DC since Greg had never been there before. We ended up driving to a train station outside of Baltimore and took a train in to DC. This was Greg’s first train station experience and he was so stressed out I started to have second thoughts about navigating Europe with him. If he can’t figure out how to buy a train ticket in America, how stressed is he going to be when he can’t read the language?? But then I remembered my first time in a train station in London and getting the stink eye from so many British people it wasn’t even funny. Not to mention getting yelled at by the British lady who had to show my friends and I how to use our card to open the gate in the crowded “tube,” during what must have been rush hour. Ahh! Yes, I forgot how confusing and stressful navigating a train station can be, but all was forgiven :). We spent the day seeing as many museums as possible. I was amazed at how much we were actually able to see in a couple of hours, but I must say, my feet have never ached so badly. I bet we walked at least 10 miles between seeing almost all of the Smithsonian museums plus walking to the Washington memorial, Lincoln Memorial, Vietnam, and WWII memorials and back again. That just makes my feet ache thinking about it again.  We ended the day at Georgetown Cupcakes (which was my only request of the day). We took a taxi there from the Smithsonian, and when we got there the line was out the door and up the street. A line full of drooling young girls who had watched the surprisingly addictive reality show of the bakery on Netflix, just as I had. One glorious hour later I tasted my first “DC cupcake,” and it was DELICIOUS! For those of you wondering why I would wait in line for a cupcake for an hour, well, if you have that question, then I guess you don’t really know me that well ;). I always wanted to go there and try them for myself because they looked so darn good on TV, and let me tell you they did NOT disappoint. Even Greg agreed that they were the best cupcakes ever and it was totally worth the wait. Casey for the WIN! Ok, I will stop talking about cupcakes now… Anyways…yes DC was awesome and I’m so glad we were able to go before we embarked on the crazy adventure that is Europe! Next stop, Germany!! (I will post pics of our DC trip later…our computer decided to crash once we got to Germany and we have to recover all of the pictures off the hard drive…bummer) But for now, I will leave you with the one pic I had on my phone from that day…cupcakes 🙂

mmmmm

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Trier, Germany

Our trip to Trier was one of our first real adventures in “Das Deutschland.” After a few stressful minutes of scouring a map in one of our handy Germany travel guides, we located an interesting looking city within driving distance, Trier. As it turns out, Trier was a very influential city during the era of the Roman Empire. It is the oldest city in Germany and with that, promised a chance to see some of the oldest architecture that this country has to offer. Trier was a mainstay during the Roman Empire, it even served as a residence of Emperor Constantine for a few years. We set out on our drive to Trier along the autobahn through the German country side. The view was second to none, with towering windmills affixed in a background of lush rolling green hills. Driving along the autobahn was generally uneventful, with the exception of a few moments of tempted american road rage. Once we arrived in Trier, it was apparent that we were not the only tourist with the idea to make our way to this historic city. Within a few moments of arriving in Trier, Casey carefully fought her way through the crowd to a Crepe stand, where she quickly communicated in mixture of English/German/French to order up two nutella and banana crepes. After we ate we headed to the Porta Nigra, which is the last standing Roman gate. After a few minutes of trying to capture a decent picture, deterred by the groups of tourists walking in front of my camera, we moved on to the Cathedral in the town center. The Cathedral is the oldest christian church in Germany. This is by far the most impressive building I have ever been in. Not only is it the oldest, but it is by far the most ornate. The shear size of the structure was enough to leave an unprepared tourist (like myself) breathless, not to mention the level of detail in the architecture and fine craftsmanship. To say I was speechless and in awe would be an understatement of mass proportions. I could have walked around the sanctuary for hours, but luckily I had Casey pushing me along. We headed out to the Roman baths and the Archaeological museum. The museum was great (except the fact that it was all in German and the audio tour we rented only explained about 30% of the displays). After a long day or walking around and taking in the sights, we were ready to return to our car and make our way home. In the end, Trier was a very historic city and a great short day trip for us. We look forward to our next adventure, and cannot not wait to share it. –Greg

Moving day is finally here! Bye bye belongings! Hope you don’t sink in the ocean somewhere :)

Saying Goodbye to my stuff!!

IT’S FINALLY MOVING DAY!! Can you tell I’m excited?! Even though the last month or so has been craziness since we found out we were going to Germany, now that the movers are here, it’s all becoming more real. I cannot wait to finally get over there (just in time for the magical Christmas season, might I add!!). It’s kind of weird having strangers come in your house, pack up all your things into cardboard boxes, and then into bigger wooden boxes to be carried off across the ocean not to be seen for months and months (or possibly ever…please don’t sink ship,mmk, thanks). I can’t even begin to tell you what all we have done to prepare for our move. I probably have about 10 lists lying around the house right now. …hmm, hope the movers didn’t pack those….oops. First of all, the military likes to wait until the last possible minute to inform you of where you are going, then you have to wait another month for your orders to be official so you can actually start getting stuff done. Yay Air Force! So after we finally got our actual orders we started the loooong process of scheduling movers, getting my car ready to be shipped— aka a whole lotta paperwork and insurance, permission letters, blah blah blah, overseas physicals including having a dental check to make sure my teeth are ok to go overseas (what?!), and an official “approval” from the Colonel saying I’m “OKAY” to leave from a medical standpoint (thank you for being controlled migraines!), figuring out how to fly over my baby girl piper, figuring out our tickets to Germany, international drivers licenses, get a PO box in Germany to have our mail forwarded to, updated passport and government passport, figuring out what to pack for the next 2-3+ months of living out of a suitcase, getting rid of stuff we don’t need or want (this is one of the greatest things I love about moving frequently!), and quitting my job and having to say goodbye to all of my dear friends and patients at the infusion clinic (I love and miss you guys)!! WHEW, you get the picture, it’s a LOT. And on top of ALL that, we decided to have our wedding that we never had before we leave for Germany so I’ve also been planning that with the help of my mom, mother in law, and friend Brenda, (ok, let’s be honest, they are pretty much doing everything wedding related for me). So yeah,  I’ve been a little MIA these last several weeks and this is my formal apology to all my friends, family, and husband who I may have forgotten to text/email back or have just plain tuned out at times (sorry babe). A girl can only handle so much!! Alright, I’m tired now. Let’s get this show on the road! Oh and thru all that I would just like to brag on my husband who got everything done so quickly and who kept me from having meltdowns.
Oh, and I should also mention he is finishing out his weather class ranked #2 in his class! Rock star weather man! So happy he is FINALLY done with training in the military and can actually start working after 2 years of schooling! You awesome babe! See ya’ll on the flip side!! Wish I knew how to say see ya later in German….Better get on that too…

Holy Cow, we are moving to….Germany!!!

This is mine (and Piper’s), “We are moving to Germany!!” face

G is excited too!!

AHHHHH! After months, and weeks, and more weeks, and more months of waiting, we FINALLY got our orders! We are officially moving to GERMANY!!! Now, let me back up a bit. Over the last 2 months my husband and I have been patiently (sometimes not so patiently) waiting for his much needed orders to come through to find out where we were going to be living the next 2-4 years. Our “options” were to choose between Germany, Hawaii, and South Carolina (seriously, how did we get so lucky???), and we had to put them in preference of our #1,2, and 3 choices. I remember Greg sending me the text while I was at work several weeks ago saying the choices and asking me for my preference. He then added…”hurry up, I have to submit it now. You have about 5 seconds.” My text back went a little like this..”omg what?!? 5 seconds?? ok, I got this. Hawaii, Germany, SC…no….make it South Carolina, Hawaii, Germany (I had a moment of weakness when I realized how “easy” it would be to be close to home rather than overseas), no no no definitely put Germany, South Carolina, Hawaii!”…I hit send and my heart was racing. What have I done?? Don’t get me wrong, I was EXTREMELY excited at the thought of living in Germany or Hawaii, but being in SC would’ve been so nice to be back in our neck of the woods where everything is familiar, and we are close to friends/family etc. Needless to say it was a harder decision then I ever thought it would be. So he submitted our preference, and we waited, and waited, and waited, and waited some more. Weeks went by and I literally thought I was going to go insane (I may have, just a little). But alas, last Friday, I was at work and received the glorious text that we received our orders to Germany! I had a rush of excitement, and a tinge or nervousness as I realized all that would change and what we would need to do to prepare (with not much time to do it in)…but hey, that’s military life for ya. Needless to say, the rest of the day I was in a bit of a fog (sorry to my beloved patients!…everyone made it out okay 😉 ), and we celebrated that night at one of our favorite restaurants and rushed straight over to the nearest bookstore to look at books on traveling Germany and all of Europe for that matter. We are beyond excited, can you tell?!? This is a chance of a lifetime, and I intend to take advantage of every opportunity to travel and experience so many different cultures, food, scenery, etc.  But I must say, I will miss my family and friends…waaaaah!! I love you all! Come visit me please 🙂