My Wife, Courtney!

I had a last minute, fabulous visit from my girlfriend Courtney in February!  Courtney and I were co-counselors together for many summers at camp and my travel partner to Chicago!  She had two weeks to fill between her birthright tour to Israel and her travels in India for a wedding and she asked if she could come stay with me!  How great is that!?  She's already spent quite a bit of time in Italy so her visit was all about relaxing, visiting, drinking wine, and being my stay at home wife for two weeks, it was wonderful!

We visited Lake Barcis.  I love that place, it is beautiful in every season!

 That's beauty right there!

We took a trip to Verona, home of Romeo and Juliet.  Neither of us had been there so we went to visit for the weekend and we both LOVED it.  It was such a quaint city that was perfect for people watching.

This is a main piazza in Verona taken from the top of the Colosseum in the city.

 This is the restaurant where we sat for a few hours for lunch.  As we were sitting soaking up the sunlight children began to gather in the piazza dressed in their costumes for Carnevale.  We were enjoying people watching as more and more began to gather.  We then figured something must be going on down there for the celebration.  About 30 minutes later there is a huge crowd of people and there is a MASSIVE Carnevale parade going through the center with costumes, bands, floats, confetti, silly string, music, and dancers!  It was great!

Juliet's balcony...Romeo, Romeo, where for art thou Romeo?

 This is the entrance to Juliet's house (courtyard).  Everyone writes on the wall for their love.  So we had to join in the tourist tradition and add our loves to the wall as well!

Standing on the top of the Colosseum in Verona.

Playing in the piazza.  Apparently not much happens at 1am on a Thursday...but we didn't need people to stay entertained!

 Celebrating Carnevale in Venice with our painted faces, confetti, and of course, gelato!

We were attempting to have the confetti raining down on us for the picture, after multiple attempts, this was as good as we could get!  

We had a fabulous visit and it was so wonderful having Court come stay!  She was the perfect house guest, doing dishes, washing clothes, even helping me put on a baby shower for my friend Kika!  Court- if you have an interest in Florida, I'll be there in 2 months...I'm just saying :)

St. Moritz, Switzerland- Christmas 2011

Christmas 2011...just the other day, right?  Oh well.  We went to St. Moritz, Switzerland for our last Christmas in Europe.  We headed up there through snow covered mountains with my safety conscious driver going 20 mph for about an hour through the mountains.  But props to him for getting us there all in one piece, I suppose there is something to be said for that, thanks babe!  We arrived in the evening and wandered through the town to find some dinner and do some exploring.

Found my favorite lit up, snow covered street that was just beautiful!  And in the photo below one of the big hotels had this gorgeous tree lit up outside and the fresh snow just made it EVEN better!

How beautiful is that?  It was outside one of the major hotels in the town.  Though not quite where we were staying.  Upon doing a little research St. Moritz is a playground for the rich and famous going on their European ski vacations so there were a few very ritzy massive hotels inside town that were quite impressive, this would be one of them :)  We found a nice restaurant for dinner...with EXCELLENT ravioli, onion soup, salad, and water.  As expected, St. Moritz proved to be just as pricey as our last trip to Switzerland.  $100 ravioli dinner right there, people!  And when I say it was excellent, it certainly was, buuuut, not $100 excellent :)

I think we blended, Taylor and I were both classing it up in our pea coats, no one even knew we stayed in the hotel at the BOTTOM of the hill at the foot of town, we fooled them!

On Christmas Eve day, we attempted to go skiing, unfortunately it was cloudy, windy, foggy, and snowing.  We bought our passes and rode up to the slopes.  We both did two runs down and agreed we were done for the day.  The visibility was so poor you could hardly see right in front of your skis.  So we gave it up for the day and went to wander the town in the afternoon.

That evening we stopped at an outdoor bar in town with Christmas music playing and flame heaters going.  We had our Christmas eve cocktails in the snow.  These are the things I will miss over here.

Drinking my hot wine (gluhwein) on Christmas Eve in the snow :)

Christmas Day could not be more gorgeous.  It was perfect skiing weather, with great snow from the day before.  It was a great day on the slopes and a perfect way to celebrate the birth of Christ the King.  His creation is great!

Taum Sauk Memories

As many of you know I, along with numerous others, are very fond of a special little place in the Ozark Mountains of Missouri.  A place I have spent many memorable summers with friends that have spanned decades from cabin mates to fellow staff members to forever friends.  This special little place is located in Lesterville, Missouri and more specifically is Camp Taum Sauk.  I've been receiving updates lately from camp friends and it has gotten me thinking about some of my favorite camp moments over the years.  So here goes...in no particular order some of my favorite times:

1) My first Staff Week Mystery Date party listening to the classic "Nurse Speech".  I knew at that point I had picked the perfect summer job!

2) An overnight at The Farm with the Honky cabin when Kelly was a camper and Megan was the other Honky counselor and after the girls went to bed we started a dance party in the living room standing on all the chairs.  One by one the girls came downstairs to see all the counselors on top of the chairs dancing and they all joined in for a good 30 minutes dancing and singing at the top of our lungs!

3) Another overnight at The Farm when Clarissa was deathly ill...but hanging in there none the less.  And I was cooking dinner with Lexi and I can't remember who else.  Dinner was late as I'm sure we took a crazy long time to float to Kyle's Bluff and the campers were all STARVING.  We were preparing as fast as we could while still having fun in the kitchen, we prepared the whole chicken tetrazzini meal and while bringing it out to the girls realized we forgot to add the chicken to the meal :).

4) The infamous night at Vespers with the juice pot and Carrie Berry's creation.  I am fairly certain not one participant left that night with all their dignity in tact.

5) Katie Berry's best line ever: "Girls...this is what happens when you eat bad mayonnaise..."

6) 1am pontoon rendezvous with my "lover" via the camp trial.

7) My fabulous camp wedding organized by Clarissa and friends when I had to leave early to get married.

8) Alain and Nathan being the hottest Hot Cops ever for Clarissa on her special evening.  They put on quite the show...

9) A gasp of shock from our favorite counselor when she was assigned the youngest girl's cabin..."WHHHAAT!?!?"  And of course:  "WEEENIE RIGHT...WEEENIE RIGHT...WEEENIE RIGHT!"

10) Nights at the local bar with the girls and Marty...Lesterville brings out the finest!

11) I was on a K-Bridge canoe float with a group of campers and was watching a boat that was being particularly obnoxious throughout the whole float (and K-Bridge is a 13 mile float).  And as we're just getting through a section of rapids the kids were goofing off and had turned their boat around backwards and weren't paying any attention.  I started to give them instructions to turn their boat, but stopped as I saw what was about to happen.  There was a large log sticking out of the water they were about to hit.  They weren't paying a bit of attention so I let fate step in.  They ran into the log and both flipped backwards off their seats.  Karma can be so sweet.  No worries, neither were hurt...sometimes life teaches the best lessons!

12) Butt Rot Monday with Jason Brightfield when it was 105 degrees and every activity was on the water.  And not only was it Butt Rot Monday, there was a sign on Capaha with balloon butt cheeks to go with it.  Jason was so fabulous.  "Ring that bell!!!"

13) And lastly, though I could honestly go on for days about favorite memories from camp, my all time favorite night at camp from all 6 years included the following events: Sitting quietly on the tennis courts listening to people's conversations when they weren't paying enough attention to know they had an audience.  Watching events transpire between a budding couple with fire cracker noise makers, flipping on lights in the staff lounge, scoping out the camp vans, chasing skunks through the grounds and finally using the infamous spotlight to watch staff scatter to their cabins.  I don't know that I have ever laughed so hard in my entire life. To my partners in crime...will there ever be a time to reveal that fun little secret?

Taum Sauk is a special place that holds some of my favorite memories and will always feel like home to me.  What are some of YOUR favorite memories...it's always fun to reminisce.

Berlin, Germany

As typical, I'm behind on my blogging, but I have included our Thanksgiving trip to Berlin.  Taylor and I flew out early Friday morning and arrived that evening.  We spent all day Saturday touring the capitol of Germany rich with history from being the Nazi Germany headquarters to the split city of the Cold War.  The city was very different from many we have visited because while the history of Europe is hundreds and thousands of years old..much of the history of Berlin is merely 20 years old.  Therefore while other cities have had hundreds of years to rebuild and form into tourist meccas...Berlin is still in the rebuilding process.  They still have many areas from East Berlin that are being rebuilt after the fall of communism.  There are  many areas in the "Death Zone", the area between the walls of East and West Germany that were filled with land mines that has not been re-built.  

As we learned in our tour, Berlin is a very empty city.  Close to two million people fled or simply left the city after WWII, and between 1950 and 1980 another 300,000 fled a midst the rise of communism and the construction of the wall as we know it in the 1960s.  The city is working on re-building with their economy now resting on tourism they are struggling to provide jobs for citizens to draw them to move into the city. 

So after visiting, I wouldn't say Berlin is the prettiest of cities or even really the top of my list of favorites, but it was quite interesting to learn the history while walking through the actual landmarks where the stories occurred.  Taylor enjoyed the Cold War history aspect and has since rented multiple Cold War movies about stories of people defecting to the West...quite an interesting time.  Below are pictures from the trip.

The Berlin Dom located in East Berlin.  The cathedral was the site of many Nazi parades.  It was bombed  heavily during WWII and was not rebuilt as an exact replica, only similar.  Below is a picture of the original cathedral during Nazi Germany.

The many parades taking place in front of the Berlin Dom.  And just as a side note, it is highly illegal to display any Nazi symbols in Germany presently.  The country takes very seriously the vow to eliminate the culture of hate created during the Nazi regime.

 A national memorial hall dedicated to all victims of Germany's history.  It was originally built as a royal guard house for the New Guard in 1816.  It was another popular site for Third Reich parades.

 You have to look closely at this one, but it is a memorial of all the books burned by the Nazis in Berlin.  The memorial is underground and when you look through this glass it is empty white bookshelves big enough to hold all of the books burned at the burning in that location.  The memorial was done quite well.

 This little guy is the traffic signal man.  On all of the walk signals in Berlin, instead of the little white lit walk sign like in the States, they have this little guy who lights up in green when it is time to walk.  Taylor had noticed him and got a kick out of the icon every time we were crossing the street.  Then in our tour our guide told a story about the traffic signal man and said he is one of the signature icons of Berlin.  This picture is from outside the traffic light guy store, it was a large cutout version of the guy.  So funny.  

 Here is where the wall once stood dividing East and West Berlin.

 A sign from the Cold War (replica) posted where the allied forces could enter back and forth from East and West Berlin at Checkpoint Charlie.

Checkpoint Charlie.  The famous point where the Allied Forces could travel back and forth between East and West Berlin.  Many people also defected through this point by hiding in the engines of cars and other extreme measures to escape East Berlin.

 Again a picture of where the wall stood.  When erecting the brick significance line there was debate as to which way the plaque should read.  Of course the East Berliners felt it should face that way and the West Berliners felt it should face West.  It was determined that it should read right side up for all the West Berliners...so if you see a plaque on the ground and it is right side up, you are standing in West Berlin.

 This building was the headquarters Air Ministry for Hitler and Nazi Germany.  As you can see from the photo below, the building has hardly changed from when it was originally built.  It is one of a few buildings that avoided most damage during bombing attacks of WWII.

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 And the above two pictures show a portion of the Berlin wall.  It's really not a sight to see any longer as it has all been chipped away down to the steel reinforcement inside the concrete.  The wall you see in the history books with kids protesting to tear it down and graffiti decorating the side is no longer.  As Bud Schuller always told us when we went inside Wick's Cave at camp....the stalactites and stalagmites are beautiful inside the cave because of the designs they make and the water dripping creating such patterns and beauty.  But when you break off the stalactite to take with you, all you have is a rock outside of the cave, it has lost all its beauty and meaning.  I feel the same about the wall.  As a whole wall together it would have been a neat site to see, but since everyone took a piece of it...this is all that is left.  And all those people who took a portion, have a piece of rock that doesn't mean nearly as much when it is sitting on a shelf in your room as it would on a wall in a historical scene.  Sorry...little rant of mine!  Anyway...

Me in front of the wall with the Air Ministry headquarters building in the background.  That building is currently used as a government building...something with taxes, if I remember correctly.

There are a few portions of the wall that have been preserved.  This portion was painted after a famous photograph capturing an East Berlin guard defecting to freedom in the West.

This site was completed in 2004 as a memorial to the murdered Jews of Europe.  It is a beautiful site with open ended meaning as to what the blocks represent.  It very large and you have the ability to walk through it as the blocks get very tall in the center, up to 15.5 feet.

 A view from walking through the memorial.

 Here is Brandenberg Gate, a very famous area surrounded presently by many embassies, including the US embassy.  Which in turn results in the square being a very politicized area with protests and picket signs.  There was one going on while we were there about the war in Iraq.  Below is a picture of the gate during Nazi Germany.

 And finally the beautiful Christmas markets that were scattered throughout all of Berlin.  I found my nativity scene I've been looking for.  It is hand carved olive wood set by a vendor from Bethlehem who comes to the market every year.  It is a beautiful set that I love and I bought it with Christmas money from Mama!  Check out the picture!

They sure do Christmas right in Germany...check out the decorations in the shopping center.  So beautiful!

So...there is our Berlin trip.  And I have to give credit to this website for the Nazi Germany pictures of Berlin to go with the current ones we took while visiting: http://www.thirdreichruins.com/berlin.htm

Happy Sunday!

Christmas Thoughts

As I am sitting by myself this evening in my dark house with Christmas lights, candles, and Christmas music I am fully enjoying this peaceful time to relax.  Even if it's only for an hour or two, man is it needed.  I have never before found Christmas to be a stressful time, I love the decorating, present buying, baking, music, lights, and celebrations.  People often say Thanksgiving is their favorite holiday because it is all about family and food without the stress of presents and parties and I'm finally seeing the truth behind that statement.  Now, don't get me wrong, Thanksgiving will never be my favorite holiday, in fact it is third behind Christmas and Halloween.  But I at least understand the statement now.

I'm trying to decide what is different about this year...and I'm thinking it is the job.  Last year I was working, but I didn't even decorate because Taylor was deployed and I was going back to the States the middle of December to spend Christmas at home.  By going home, I missed a lot of the hustle and bustle of prepping for the holiday.  And the year before, I was not working yet at Christmas, so I had plenty of time to get everything decorated, presents bought, wrapped, shipped, and then some.

I also see all the people who have given so generously to me for so many years.  Who go out of their way to ensure I  have a special Christmas and I want to be able to give back in the way they have given to me for so long.  Where to go, what to get...and make sure it is sent in enough time to arrive by Christmas.   The last part is the big kicker over here.  But as a positive and a negative, this will be my last Christmas with the concern of overseas shipping time constraints...at least for a little while.

And the final straw that is currently breaking this camel's back is our program currently going through accreditation.  This happens every 5 years and this happens to be the lucky year!  So we are going through documents, Air Force Instructions (AFI) guidelines, Unannounced Inspection criteria, Air Force Manuals, Operating Instructions, policy letters, and program procedures to find documentation and evidence that we meet all standards set forth by the Council on Accreditation.  We are creating and evaluating risk management plans, long term plans, Continuous Quality Improvement plans, producing verification letters that we operate ethical financial practices, etc, etc.  And our self study with all 60 something documents must be in the hands of the Council on Accreditation by 30 December.  Which means it is being mailed out this week with high hopes the mail is speedy!  We had our Youth specialist from US Air Force Europe headquarters in town from Germany all last week working with myself, our director, and our trainer every day for COA assistance.  I spent a fun 8 hours today (Saturday) at work uploading and creating documents and probably have another 16 hours to go.  While there is never a good time to add a few hundred hours of work to your plate, December is certainly NOT the month.  But, within the next week it will be mailed off and out of our hands!  Or until they come back with questions requesting more evidence.  But it will be such a relief to have this portion completed.  Our next task will be to gather our on-site documents to have ready when the endorsers come to visit our program in March.  Phew.  Hallelujah!

And in between work and accreditation I have work Christmas parties for myself and Taylor, friend Christmas parties, farewell dinners, Airman Cookie drives, potluck dishes, and raffle presents to create.  Such a festive but exhausting Christmas this year.  And just as I'm feeling incredibly overwhelmed, very appropriately timed, I just opened a daily advent reflection book written by church members back home that arrived in the mail this week.  Clearly I need to get over myself and my busy schedule and reflect on the reason this day is celebrated to begin with.

Merry Christmas to you all!!

Much to be Thankful for...

Has a month really passed since my last post?  Not sure how that happened...buuuut to sum it up with a few short statements:

Fall Fest event on base- 44 different activities available sponsored by different basewide organizations, 265 volunteers, almost 6000 participants, and zero negative feedback equals a majorly successful event!

Now reunited with the hubby after a month of travel between the two of us.  Happy days :)

Put on a Thanksgiving feast at work for all the children and families- 160 for dinner is a big meal!  Thanks to a few staff and helpers who fried 8 turkeys and prepared all of the food, everything went smoothly!

Had a delicious Thanksgiving meal at Kika and Greg's with all the fixings and some spaghetti for Taylor to uphold his family tradition.  I was a bit embarrassed bringing spaghetti to a meal with Italian guests because I'm sure their family recipes passed down from generation to generation is a little better than my Prego and Ragu mix...but oh well :)  They had spaghetti American style...or at least Katie style!

Quick trip to Berlin on Thanksgiving weekend.  It was a trip full of history from Napoleon invasions to Nazi Germany, to Soviet communist control.  And not only was there great history...there were 54 Christmas markets in the city.  We went by about 6 of them just wandering through the city.  And I found my Nativity scene I've been looking for.  Olive wood, hand carved set from Jerusalem.  I mean, really, how cool is that?  The vendor comes to the Berlin Christmas market every year (7 years so far) from Jerusalem where he has his shop.  I'm so excited...I'll post a picture when I get the decorations up...hopefully this week.

A few birthdays have happened...my wonderful mother and my sweet sister both had birthdays in November.  They are now an average combined age of 37...hmmm...someone came out on the good end of that mathematic equation...I'll let you guess who!

We are starting to hear talks of a next base assignment...hopefully something firm will be nailed down in the next month or two.  Looking to be Stateside bound making us only a cheap flight away from friends and family instead of a life savings flight away from everyone!  With that being said...anyone planning to make the trip over the great pond better get to planning...quick.  We are down to 10 months TOPS, left in Italia.  Three years have gone quickly!

We are about to begin month 5 without AFN (Armed Forces Network) television.  We are STILL waiting for the Italian contractor to contact us to set up an appointment to install a new satelite.  I've been waiting on the call for 3 1/2 weeks now.  I've emailed Housing 2 times in the last 3 weeks about it...THIS is a part I will NOT miss about Italy.

That's all for now, folks!

Fall Fest Frenzy!

Well, I had another wonderful trip back home.  It was a quick ten days full of family, shopping, boxes, friends, lunches, shopping, pictures, boxes, dinners, Lowes, shopping, new homes, boxes, and good ole American customer service.  So if you can't tell I saw lots of family, lots of friends, ate lots of meals out, did lots of shopping, lots of unpacking and was thoroughly impressed with the customer service in every store and restaurant I entered.  I mean seriously, I walked in a store and the workers were HAPPY I was there and they told me that about four times by checking in on me and asking if I needed help with anything.  And to top it off...they THANKED me when I left!  Now maybe I have just forgotten what it feels like to enter a store and not feel like an inconvenience to the employees (which is fully possible) but I really think customer service has improved in the time since I've moved.  I think it's something you take for granted being over in the States and maybe wouldn't notice when it improves...but coming from a place where they could care less to have your business or your money it is quite a nice change of pace. 

Two quick examples...I was in an Italian store across the street from base with a co-worker purchasing $6000 dollars worth of furniture for the Youth Center, six THOUSAND dollars in one pop!  And it took FIVE ladies 30 minutes of blatantly arguing with each other (though I could only understand bits of it) and speaking dramatically with their hand gestures and being visibly annoyed with us and expressing their frustration to us JUST to split the order on two separate credit cards.  And I'd estimate we spent about $15000 dollars there over the course of the year.  Man, really makes me want to go back again.  Unfortunately, we don't have a lot of selection and options over here...so inevitably we'll probably be back next time we need furniture as well.

And the second example has to do with our HUGE first annual Fall Fest event on base.  For decorations and activities at the festival we were looking in the community for 200 hay bales and 500 pumpkins to purchase for this event happening tomorrow.  Now, to give a little background, Italians do not celebrate Halloween as we know it in the States and it is a bit odd to them that we decorate with corn stalks, hay bales, and pumpkins.  Corn and hay is for cow feed and pumpkins are in season for all the restaurants' menus:  pumpkin soup, pumpkin pasta, pumpkin crepes, etc. but not for a good ole Jack-o-Lantern.  So to go around asking for 200 RECTANGLE hay bales and 500 pumpkins brought a lot of puzzled looks.  But may I also give an important detail that in Aviano we are surrounded by farm land on every side of the base and for miles and miles on three sides (the fourth side starts the mountains)  I regularly get stuck behind tractors on my way to work as they are traveling between the fields.  So as you can imagine...there are round hay bales everywhere.  So we start asking around looking to buy 200 rectangle hay bales and 500 pumpkins...all in one pop.  "No possible!  DUE CENTO (200)!?!?!?!  Ohhh nooo, nooo."  Really people, you have someone willing to spend a lot of money on hay bales and pumpkins all at once approaching YOU...and you say it's not possible?  You don't know ANYONE in this farming community that you could work a deal with to get these things?  So finally I thought of the nursery where I go to buy my plants, because I really like the people there and they are so helpful.  So I get the same shocked look, but instead of "No possible..." Paolo tells me he will make some calls and talk to his supplier in Holland and would get back to me the next day.  Now THAT'S what I'm talking about. 

And to bring us up to today...in major Fall Fest preparation mode as the event is taking place tomorrow, Paolo delivered 200 rectangle hay bales and 500 pumpkins on base to the Youth Center gym.  Now there's a smart business man, because this event will be happening every year, and they now have a repeat customer just from making a few calls.

And speaking of Fall Fest happening TOMORROW, have I mentioned that yet?  We've been in major prep mode and we're hoping and praying we can pull this whole thing off.  So far so good, with only a few minor hiccups.  One of which regarding the 200 hay bales unloaded in our gym.  Somehow Fire got word of this happening and stopped by to let us know that it presented a fire hazard and would have to be moved 100 feet to sit directly next to the building...outside.  We tried to bribe them with candy to let us keep it there 'til tomorrow morning when it will be transformed into a maze outside, but they were having nothing of it!  So we made the minor placement adjustment, and by WE, I mean all the teens in the program along with a few of the staff!  But along with the 200 hay bales and 500 pumpkins being dropped off, we had 60 tables, 60 benches, 25 canopies, 3 Alaskan tents, 3 Port-o-Potties, 3 generators, 3 Light All portable lights, 2 Gator tractors, a climbing wall, and about 2,000 bags of candy.  All while planning this whole event with approximately 18 staff.  If everything goes as planned we will have 18 volunteer Trick or Treat Stations, 6 carnival games, 4 sponsor booths, 3 arts and crafts booths, 2 bouncing castles, Child Development Center sensory tables, a pumpkin patch, an outdoor movie, flashlight tag, a hay bale maze, an outdoor climbing wall, a fire truck, a Security Forces humvee, a costume parade, 55 volunteers, and 3000-5000 participants.

Yeah, tomorrow is a big day.  I am now off to bed!