Leavin' on a Jet Plane

Okay, I got tired off waiting to get on a military flight and broke down and got a regular ticket to come home. I'll be back in Washington by dinnertime Wednesday! I can't wait. I have today to clean up the house so Rob isn't left with dirty dishes and I can get a new ID card since mine expires soon.
At least this way I won't have to try for a flight back to Germany in August. I know I can simply enjoy my time while on vacation-- until August 19th! That's more than a month to visit with family and friends and see Lindsey & Kristen's little babies! (Do I sound just a little excited?-- Well, I am super stoked!) The only down side is going over a month without Rob. I know it is do-able (hey, how do you think we survived 2 year-long deployments, huh?) But I definitely wish Rob could have taken leave to come (which he technically did get approved for but then "Dave" decided he needed the leave time more than Rob did- *arrrg!*)
Oh well, at least I will get to go shopping and prepare for our cruise next month (just wait, I'll tell you more about our upcoming cruise in a later post. For now....
All I can think about is getting to go back to WA for a while. =)

Getting Ready to Shop

I am (hopefully) heading back to the States any day now to visit with family and friends -- and do some shopping. First I wanted to share some of my recent purchases (you already saw my German cow dolls in the previous post).

These kimono-style wine bottle covers were very inexpensive and just too cute not to grab a handful of for display.

I bought some more Jibbitz for my crocs. I had posted earlier (here) about buying my Winnie the Pooh Jibbitz- well, now I have a bunch of CareBears to join them. I just won on Ebay some pink breast cancer awareness CareBears with a pink ribbon on their tummies to add to the group. And by tomorrow I will know if I won 3 other CareBears that I do not yet have.How styling my feet will be now!

Our 4th in Garmisch

Over the long holiday weekend we went camping at Edelweiss in Garmisch, Germany with a group of friends. We took our wonderful new friend "Nancy" (our Navigon GPS) and drove through some very beautiful areas of Austria on the 3rd. The next day (the 4th itself) we visited the small PX and the PX stocked with camping gear. I finally got a camelpak water bottle with a built in straw that I had been searching for at our own PX. That night the fireworks were amazing! We both had never seen them so big - there was no blank sky in my peripheral vision- it was all filled with the exploding colored lights.
On Saturday we went to a charming little town named Ettal and visiting a cheese farm where we bought half a round of some wine cheese and saw this wooden cow out front (with some real cows in a field behind her.)Then it was off to Linderhof Palace with the over the top decoration and beautiful grounds. There is a really neat man-made cave, a cute little chapel and an interesting hunting lodge on the grounds as well that we visited. There was also some cute gift shops where I picked up this adorable little couple.
We packed up the tent and headed out Sunday morning- once again driving through a small part of Austria and stopped at Schwetzingen Palace and Gardens just before reaching home. We had lunch across the street while we waited for the English tour to start. This palace was not so elaborately decorated as the Linderhof one was, but there was one room which had walls and drapery made with a silk that costs 2,000 Euros per square meter! We did not have time- and the sun started to hide too much- to fully enjoy the massive gardens so we will need to return to see those some other day.
It was a wonderful weekend and Rob was extra sweet and loving since it seems a couple of weeks ago I had complained on night that I didn't like Work Rob who was so tired and grumpy in the evenings and I was missing Vacation Rob who is so much more fun. He had remembered that and put even more care to making sure we made the most of our camping experience.
Towards the end of August (after I get back from a visit to Washington) we are heading back to Edelweiss- but to the lodge instead of the campground this time- and will hopefully get a chance to visit some places in the area that we still haven't seen (or blogged about) yet.