Out to lunch bunch

So the Spouses Club on base has a lot of activities going on, and one of those activities is the monthly "Out to lunch bunch." At the welcome party for the OSC, I signed up for a whole bunch of things (I got a little carried away). It wasn't until I started receiving emails for the morning bunko group, the morning book club, the Airmen's Cookie Drive! that I realized I had to pick my out of home activities wisely.

I like to explore new places to eat and to take Zev to, so I figured the lunch group would be fun. And it is! Today we went to a Hibachi Restaurant and enjoyed the cooking display. It was neat to meet some lovely ladies who live right around my neighborhood!

Apparently the next lunch bunch meeting is at an old plantation. I'll definitely take pictures of that. Zev and I like it here more and more each day. There is tons to do and we are thinking of going to the State Fair this weekend! Hope you all have a great week!

Fifi xo

Pyjama party on base!

Yes, I spell "pyjama" the Australian way; US = "pajama".  Same thing!!

Last night the Spouses Club on base had a Pyjama Party! Well it was really a "Bedtime Bunko" event and everyone was meant to wear they PJs. As you can see, I went a little understated. My PJ bottoms had a cute blue polker dot print and I wore matching blue earrings to bring out the blue. I originally had this bright blue top on with a monkey on it, but I thought I would stick to the khaki green top.

Some ladies went all out with tiger print pyjamas.

The fun thing about the game of "Bunko" is that you get to switch out and move to another table after each round (if you win). That way, you get to meet a lot of people. The funny part for me was hearing all the ladies ask "where does your husband work" to each other and hearing stuff like "A8" or "A4" or up at the Command. You have to be a military wife to understand the lingo sometimes. Like TDY. PCS.

The best part of course is always the prize table. But I didn't win any. Oh well. Better luck next time.

Hope you have a HAPPY FRIDAY!

Our first visitor!

My cousin Lizette is in northern Virginia for work this month. Since she normally lives in California, we thought it was a perfect time for her to come and visit us and catch up! I barely know the tourist sights here, so I took her to the beautiful and historical tourist location of Colonial Williamsburg.

It rained all day, which was a shame. Today is a beautiful, sunny day, which makes it an extra shame that it rained so much this past weekend!

I really like Colonial Williamsburg, because of the well maintained historic buildings and the fact that there are lots of local townsfolk dressed up in Colonial dress and talking in an old English style.

We watched and heard the Fife and Drums march by.

And enjoyed traditonal fare in a historic English pub.

We then did some shopping in the cute little stores in downtown Williamsburg. (I've heard that they do an incredible Christmas Market, similar to the ones in Germany, at Christmas time. I can't wait.)

I hope that you have a fantastic week! Enjoy each day.

xoxoxo

Settling in

G'day everyone!

Just two weeks ago, the movers delivered our things. Zev started his first week of work last Tuesday, and I received my first two new cases the day that the movers arrived! So we have been plenty busy unpacking and settling in. (Wanna come help us unpack?! Haha)

We like the area that we live in and getting used to hot weather again.

One of my favorite features of the house we are renting is the fact that the backyard is nice and large, albeit full of mosquitos, which makes it near impossible to sit outside and have dinner at night. Maybe in Autumn or Winter...

The tree house is also cool. Zev and I are planning on getting out there one of these weekends to clear some sticks and leaves and get the tree house up and running again. I climbed into it the day we arrived and wanted to use the flying fox, but Zev needs to put a hook on it again to make it work.

The view from our kitchen is also lovely. We have a dining room but the movers broke our (Australian custom made!) dining room table in half, so we can't use that room. Our neighbors are also super nice. We feel abundantly blessed by God, because at each posting we have had (this is our 5th house together!) we have had amazing neighbors. Most of the people in our neighborhood are retired or active duty military. The base is not far away which makes it a nice commute for Zev. Some of our neighbors have college football season tickets and already invited us to come along to watch a college game in October. Another set of neighbors have invited us to have dinner with them at the yacht club. These neighbors also brought over some Chick-Fil-A (am I spelling that right?) when we were doing this: 

I had never had Chick-Fil-A before and it was tasty. It seems that every store under the sun is in the nearby area which to me, is a mixed blessing. I kind of liked the fact that our choices were limited in Germany (we shopped at the Commissary or at our local, tiny supermarket) and that everything was closed on Sundays and after 7pm. I'm sure I will appreciate the 24hr aspect of Wal-Mart eventually.

Well, I wish I had more interesting pictures to share this week, but I will leave you with the one above, taken recently on Virginia Beach. Living near a beach makes this posting VERY easy to appreciate. God bless and have a great week!

Zev's Virginia Beach Half Marathon experience...

T-Shirt: Free

Two grainy pictures from race sponsor: $49.99

Entry fee: $99.00
Stopped doing 70 miles per hour in a 55 zone: $165.00

Running a Half Marathon without training: PRICELESS!

I was proud of Zev's effort today. Considering we have been living out of a suitcase since mid July and on the road a lot, Zev ran an awesome time (I wanted to put his time down but he said "a man never reveals his time.) It was definitely under two hours, let's just say that. We actually traveled down to VA Beach yesterday to pick up Zev's race packet.

As this is Labor Day long weekend, VA Beach was packed.

We stopped for lunch at a Greek restaurant on the beach. The Dolmades reminded us of our time in Greece earlier this year!

We left home at 6am this morning to drive to VA Beach. One funny piece of information I would like to share here, is that we got up at 5.00am for a 5.45am departure. I had a shower last night and so was ready at 5.45am to depart but someone was dilly dallying a little bit. We stopped on the way at Starbucks for Zev to get a cup of coffee (yes, before a half marathon!) and at this point I asked Zev "doesn't the race start at 7am? Zev responded "oh no, they just want us to be there at 7am. Race doesn't start until 7.30am."

After I dropped Zev off near the start line at 6.59am and then went to look for parking, I noticed that there were a bunch of people already running! I had signed up online to track Zev's run pace using my smartphone. Let's just say that the first SMS I received was to tell me that Zev had crossed the start line at 7.12am. Not bad for a 13 minute warm up

It really looked like a great race to run and I hope to run it with Zev next Labor Day long weekend! It was cool to see groups such as the "Hoyt" running team, who pushed people with cystic fibrosis in wheelchairs along the route.

Zev had good running form, right until the finish line!

The best part was that he was done by 9am and we were home by 11am!

This week, Zev returns to work (on Tuesday) and I already have two EEO cases to work on from home! We hope that you have a great week too!



It's September already!

PCS time (Permanent Change of Station) is always a "fun" time of the year. I can't believe that it's September already! Where did August go? We are into our second day of unpacking in our new home and are taking it all in our stride. I have been rather tired these past few days and Zev has been awesome in moving boxes and setting up the (many) shelve units and tables etc which got dismantled by the German movers. There are always plenty of "war stories" during a military move (because we move so often) but let's just say that the big ones for us are that a box of our clothes got soaked (and mouldy) and that the table top on our dining room table is now in two pieces (that broke on the German end). The main thing is that all this stuff is really just that- stuff. It doesn't matter in the grand scheme of things and we just need to be patient as the military reimburses us or fixes our stuff.

We were very fortunuate in being able to visit Zev's family and friends in upstate NY after we left Germany and then spend some time in northern Virginia (just outside of Washington DC) at the end of our trip. Our time in NY involved a lot of visiting with family including an Italian dinner with Zev's grandma Anna; going to a baseball game with Zev's parents and his uncle Joe; going to Ithaca and out on the lake with Zev's best friend, Mike and his wife, Deanna; visiting the waterfalls in Ithaca and just hanging out.

Here are some pictures of our Italian lunch/ dinner at Grandma Anna's. She is 97 and still looking good! She also has a great sense of humour!

Aunt Barbara showing us her yummy tomato sause.

Zev's beautiful mum, Judy, with some fresh greens.

These cherry tomatoes were straight from Judy's incredible garden. She has so many veggies and greens; and they all taste delicious. These tomatoes were so sweet, they were like candy.

GOTTA have Italian Bread.

The star of the show surrounded by some of her favorite men.

Dinner time!

After our 12 days in upstate NY we then headed to DC and stayed with our old friends, TJ and Julia and their sweet baby boy, Alexander. We had to go to DC for me to do my annual refresher training for my business and took advantage of the opportunity to do some sight-seeing. I really liked DC and would like to return and visit the Smithsonian museums. Here we are in front of the White House.

Zev even took me out for some Japanese food during the lunchtime break in my course!

Zev visited the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum while I was in class.

Our last stop before heading home to Virginia was to catch up with my cousin, Lizette, who was here on temporary duty with the Department of Navy. She is an electrical engineer for the Navy and one of the smartest people I know! She is based out of California, so it was great to catch up with her on this side of the country!

We were so blessed to not have experienced any damage from Hurricane Irene. We have met our neighbors and are very happy that we are surrounded (once again!) with really friendly and outgoing neighbors. They have already brought us over homemade banana nut bread and homemade bread. Zev is running the Virginia Beach Half Marathon this weekend, so I will be sure to post pics!

Have a great weekend and God bless.

Zev and Fi xo