To say that my life is blessed is an understatement. Don't get me wrong, there have been some pretty rough times over the years, but for the most part, I wouldn't change a thing. Now the time has come to move on once again. That's right... our new assignment. I've been more than a little stressed about this one, because it means so many huge changes in our lives. Jess will be going back to the states with us, but from there she will be heading off to college on her own. It will just be three of us at our new assignment. And that makes me very sad. (I'm excited for her, but sad for me just the same.) And then I had a dream. In my dream, I looked at where we were going and told Russ "Well, I guess our lives have come full circle now." I woke up in a sweat. What does that mean? Are we going back to Barksdale, our first base? That's where Mom is, but I really don't want to go back to Barksdale. (Nothing personal, it's a lovely area, but the job...) No big. It's just a dream, right? It doesn't mean anything. So we waited. And then the news. Our lives really are going full circle after all. We are moving back to Florida. We were stationed at there for 9 1/2 years, and absolutely loved it. Who wouldn't? Gorgeous white sand beaches, teal blue water, perfect temperatures. Our son was born there. Our daughter grew up there. We made lifelong friends there. But at that point in our lives, we wanted something more. We needed something more. We needed to see the world. Russ and I grew up in the South, and even though we had wonderful childhoods, we both always wanted to see what else was out there. So we put in for orders, and ended up with the wonderful assigment of Anchorage, Alaska. People thought we were insane to leave Florida for Alaska, but we were in heaven. And a little bit sad, too. We thought we were saying goodbye to our lovely Florida forever. When our time in Alaska was up, we put in for the South. Russ didn't have that much time left before he retires and we'd given up on getting orders overseas. He'd been trying for that since the day he signed up, and it just never worked out. The Air Force had other plans for us. We got orders to Belgium. The first thing I did was go onto Google and see where the heck Belgium was. And then I jumped up and down and screamed. We were going to the heart of Europe! And it's been amazing. We've been places that we've read about in books, and never dreamed we would get to see in person. We've met wonderful people, taken fantastic trips, and learned about different cultures. But now it's time to go home again. And we really are going home. We're going back to the Florida Panhandle, and I couldn't be happier. I can't wait to see my old friends who still live there, and then head down the beach to eat at the Back Porch Restaurant. We'll get a table by the open windows, watch the waves rolling in and seagulls diving down to the water to snag a little fish for dinner, and relax. I can't wait!
We started the year in our traditional Alaskan way...an 
Technically, I met these 
The new year in Alaska brought out all of the regular visitors. This 
March trotted in on canine feet, with the Last Great Race...
March held a couple of surprises for us as well. Not only did we have the normal amount of earthquakes, we also had some trouble from a cranky volcano. Mt. Redoubt decided to blow her top a few times, and one of the eruptions ended up with clouds of ash heading into Anchorage. That's not snow on the truck. That's volcanic ash. We were lucky that it didn't do any real damage. Other than bringing all traffic to a standstill (including the airports) and keeping all humans stuck indoors, you'd hardly notice anything was amiss. Well, 
In May, I was very fortunate to be allowed to meet the 
Todd Palin. Yep. Feel free to pause here a minute. No rush. I totally understand. Once again, you're welcome. 
A very sad occurrence happened at the end of April. Ashley and Tink boarded a plane and flew off to spend a very long "vacation" with Grandma and Grandpa. The Grandparents were kind enough to babysit them for us while we took a little detour overseas. For 3 years. Poor kitties. Well, poor me. The kitties are being spoiled rotten, and have both doubled in body size. Let's just say that Grandma is not adhering to the strict diet that I had the ladies on earlier this year. They are now both roughly the size of this ottoman.
May brought a big truck and a group of burly fellows who proceeded to pack up all of our worldly possessions and ship them off on an ocean liner. We had been trying to go overseas for our entire military career, and had pretty much given up. We were in the process of trying to decide where we were going to retire when the orders came through. Belgium. Go figure. 
Early June had us flying into the glorious country of Belgium. There aren't words enough to express how excited our whole family was about getting this opportunity to go explore Europe. I won't bother re posting pictures of our adventures here so far. Feel free to browse the blog if you care to. In the 6 months that we've lived here, we've traveled around Belgium, Germany, The Netherlands, Poland and Switzerland. We've explored castles, toured breweries, and visited amusement parks. We've experienced things that we'd only seen in books in the past. We're crossing some things off of our "bucket list" and are adding more all the time. I'd like to thank everyone who had a part in getting us over here. We really appreciate this opportunity, and are definitely making the most of it. 
