One Year

                                           Home is where the Air Force sends us


One year ago today we landed in Italy. It funny looking back all the craziness and adjusting we have done but we are just fine. :) Hard to believe we left our South Dakota base , our only home we knew as a family and headed to a foreign country. Then minets after landing and being picked up, my husband was told he would be deploying that year. (Which he just got home not too long before we moved!) And here are some other random memories:

Then we waited to see if Josh made Staff, which he did YAY!

Lived in TLF wayyyy too long (the on base hotel)

Oh and our A/c in our room was BROKE so it was very hot!

I remember I was all anxious at the commissary because it was so much different. There is a weigher that prints out a tag/price for your produce. *Blew me away lol!

It took me awhile to figure out where everything was, we have 3 separate parts to this base (miles apart)

We finally got a house. But it was empty. lol Our stuff didnt come in until a mth later. So Ethan and I would be so bored no car no stuff. But we made it through that!

We didnt know how to work our a/c units so it was hot

I found out that there are scorpions here (no one mentioned this) when I found one on our bedroom wall

We had our first taste of Italian pizza and gelato (yumm)

Realized our American money isnt so great here- 1.33 USD = 1 euro

We went to Ikea, wow that store is amazing!

Had fun figuring out our electricity over here, you cant run two big things at once! So you cant run the washer and dryer at the same time, or bake and dry something ect  (the circut blows almost every day)

Learned some Italian

We make sure to get gas before Sunday, since the gas stations close on Sunday. But you know we always end up needing gas on Sunday lol!

I thought we had a dish washer , turns out its a mini fridge :)

They dont do refills here

No butter on your popcorn at the theater

OR ice in your drink!

The cabenieri lolly popping (google it!) still scare me...

Gotten used to the crazy Italian drivers, and you think Phoenix is bad!

Pepperoni pizza is not pepperoni its peppers LOL

The American Pizza is not pepperoni pizza its topping is French fries (guys I know this from experience)

Everything closes down for risposo from 12-3pm the Italians big break in the middle of the day. So you cant get much done/

Weve gotten to do some nice traveling and more to come since we have our passports now

The beach is nice and the lakes in the mountains

So some great recaps on living over here, im sure there are a hundred more. Just cant believe its been a year! So fast. And we have two more to go. We definatly miss friends and family and America. But we are taking Italy in and enjoying this experience. Heres to 1 year!

4th of July and peter pan

Fourth of July we headed out to a big waterpark. Its called Aqualandia. Josh went on the bigger rides with some of his friends and Ethan and I hung out in the smaller kid slide area. It was really nice. 

Minus the guys in speedos and little girls with no tops. Thats how they do it over here lol. But hey they must save a lot of money on swim suits. HEHE

Ethan was really afraid of the slides when we first got there. But then he started going down them himself. Josh went down a few with him also. And I went down the white one with Ethan in the double tube. I have to admit though, yes, I was scared. Im not a ride person guys. So even this slide that just curved didint even drop or dip I was pretty scared the first time LOL!

Then we watched the petter pan show at the park. No, we didnt know anything they were saying. But they did sing the I can fly song in Italian so that was fimiliar. 

After Capt. Hook was defeted and the story ended. They had children come from the audience. They then had them hold onto the front of them and they swirl jumped off these super insane high diving boards (like in the pic) That was nuts and I should of taken a pic. But I was just so speechless! LOL

After the waterpark we went home and rested up. Then headed that night to see fireworks on base. It was nice that they did that. Before the fireworks they had a real traeze act. LIke they drove motorcycles on the wire and everything. It was nuts. 

Then the firworks came. It was a really nice show. Makes you miss America!

But it was a great 4th of July! :)

Croatia

Fathers day weekend we went to Croatia. Our first official country usuing our new travel passports. We have been to Slovenia but they have open borders.

We had a great time exploring and checking out the town we were staying in. Josh found us a nice apartment we rented and stayed two nights.

The first day we went on a ferry in the early morning (with our car). Took about 1 hr and half then we got to this other island. It had a really nice sandy beach. Josh enjoyed swimming around with his snorkling gear and Ethan and I hung out on the beach. It was a lot of fun.

The second day we headed to this big national waterfall forest. Tons and tons of waterfalls. The pictures just dont do it justice.

Then we headed home. The drive was about 5.5hrs not too bad.

*They had an out door ocean organ built by the water and the water pushed through it making music
*We walked aroung thier huge outdoor market
* had tasty gelato
* tried learning some croation words beforehand but they speak english there
* 1 us dollor = 5.75 over there (nice)
*we got our first pass port stamps in our travel passports