We're coming to America...

Well, actually, we've made it to America!  We spent a fabulous week with our families in Lincoln before arriving in Las Vegas last night.  We had a whirlwind last two months in Europe, so here's the rundown:

We took a cruise to the Eastern Mediterranean during most of November!  The pictures are on our other computer, but Tyler uploaded the best ones to facebook.  The itinerary included a day at sea between each day at port, so we had a great schedule of walking like crazy one day and reading on the deck all day the next.  We embarked in Barcelona, after spending a full day there.  It was a cool city but we felt like one day there was sufficient.  After Barcelona, we were at sea for a day and spent it exploring the ship.  It was nice, but the colors were SO LOUD, as were many of the people.  We used the ship as a means to an end--getting to see all of the cities that we did--not for the cruise itself.  For that reason, it was a great trip!  We saw Rome (we walked around to see the highlights again), Athens (we saw Keramikos, the ancient cemetary and entrance to the city and walked the shopping area), Ephesus (we stood on the steps where Paul actually spoke to the Ephesians--amazing!!), Cairo (we rode camels and saw the pyramids), Malta (kind of small after the other huge cities we'd visited, but quaint) and back to Barcelona.  We disembarked on Thanksgiving Day, so caught a cheap flight to Dublin for the rest of the weekend.  They spoke English there!  It was MUCH colder there than we'd previously experienced, but we had our hats and coats and our love to keep us warm.  All in all, a perfect "capstone" trip!

In December, we took our last trip through Bavaria, our favorite region of Europe.  We stopped in Villach at their cute little Christmas market, in Salzburg at our favorite brewery Augustiner, in Munich to see their Christmas market and Dachau, then to Andechs--our other favorite brewery.  Five days of eating würstel, sauerkraut and brezn and beer-drinking for Tyler.  We definitely planned this pregnancy wrong!

Also in December, we had our farewell from the squadron, where Splinter fake-made out with me (a fighter squadron tradition...kind of) and Otis said some really nice things about Tyler.  The squadron Christmas party was at a castle, where Tyler drank our money's worth in wine--no small feat!  We outprocessed painfully, but that's standard, and packed up our house with only a few minor mishaps.  I cried really hard on the plane as we left because we've made some amazing friends that made the adventure of living in Europe that much better.  We'll miss them much.  It's always sad to leave but exciting to arrive somewhere new.  Ok, I don't know how exciting billeting at Nellis will be, but we're off to new adventures!