Two weeks ago, I spent hours cleaning and organizing my house, packing all of our things, and then packing the car. On Wednesday morning we went to the Air Force terminal near our house to try to catch a flight back to the States. Friday morning, we finally managed to get seats, and after a re-fueling stop in Canada, arrived at long last in Delaware.
Jillian was traveling with us, which was a huge help, and her brother kindly agreed to pick us up from the base. Unfortunately, some recent terrorist threats have made it so that a civilian cannot be verbally signed in (previously, a civilian could have the guards at the front gate call the terminal inside, and have the passenger they were there to pick up "OK" the visitor's pass.) Anyway, this meant that one of us had to walk to the front gate to sign him in. I felt like I could use a bit of fresh air, and Jillian wanted to sit with the children.
I got to the visitor's center at the gate to find that her brother was nowhere around. I asked inside the center, and they claimed that they had not seen any 7-foot-tall guy at any time that day. On top of that, they did not have any phone where I could make long-distance calls (including no pay phones). I stood in the entrance way, not sure what to do with myself, when a lady walked in. I asked her if she knew about any nearby pay phones, and she graciously handed me her cell phone.
As it turned out, Jillian's brother Ryan
had been to the visitor's center, and they informed him that there was no flight coming in from Germany any time that day. They suggested that one might be coming in the next day, so he went and got a hotel room for the night.
Of course Ryan immediately drove to the front gate, and when we walked into the building, they didn't say anything. I'm not sure why they were being such idiots, but they sped us through sign in very quickly and sent us on our way. Still makes me mad, so I'm not going to think about it anymore.
We ended up getting to my parents' house by around 11pm that night, and it was wonderful, as always, to finally be home.
For the first few days, the children woke at 5:30 as though on a timer. I was hungry anyway the first day, but after that it grew quickly old. My siblings started helping me by taking shifts in the mornings, and letting me sleep in a little or else take a nap later on after giving them breakfast.
Now they've started sleeping in a tiny bit longer (the good late time of 6:30 or similar), so it's getting a little better. Part of the trouble is that my parents don't have any shades at all, and in Germany we have blackout shades, so they're not used to waking up with the sun. It's kind of frustrating, but it's just the way it is for now, I guess. Better than being alone in Germany, by any means.
We've already done a lot of stuff since arriving here -- the pictures say it all, so here's a series of collages from some of our adventures.
We spent the day at a petting farm and vegetable stand:
Got ice cream at our favorite spot:
Made granola:
Elijah turned three (I made the world's ugliest coffee cake, but it was also very good tasting and was entirely gone by the end of the day):
And we spent some time at Poppy and Nana's:
JIll got some great pictures of Lavella:
That's all for now, kids. I'll post back soon with more!
