Holy Springtime!

Oh my. It's been a busy spring. And our time is quickly winding down! We have been having some SERIOUS adventures. Here's a re-cap:

The end of February (or was it the beginning of March?) Tim dislocated his shoulder (a horrific ordeal that will have to be detailed in a less public way at some other time) and got the corrective surgery to anchor the torn what-cha-ma-call-it. That was a very, uh, exciting time for us, but he's taken good care of it and is still going to daily PT to get his full range of movement. He begins strength training for it this week.

Midway through March, we jetted over to Dublin for Tim's cousin's wedding. Tim still had to wear his shoulder brace, but got to imbibe plenty of whisky and Guinness. I freaking LOVED what tiny little bit of Ireland I saw. Tim's family lives in a village just outside of Dublin called Dunboyne and this is where the wedding was and where we all stayed. We were literally there long enough to see a tiny bit of downtown Dublin, go to the Guinness factory, and then do all the wedding stuff which was great fun. The Irish party. The wedding on Saturday began at 2 pm and the FIRST bus home from the reception was at 12:30. The last day was a big get together at Tim's aunt and uncle's house where we ate, drank, and sang songs while Tim's Uncle Frank played his guitar. We were fortunate to be able to be there--it was the first time all the cousins in his family had been together since they were all little people.

Tim continued healing and in mid-April we met Tim's parents in Venice to begin our Italian spring break. That was an incredbile vacation. We stayed in Venice, Bologna, and went through Maranello (home of Ferrari) with Bill and Carol before they left for home and we continued west to Florence and the Cinque Terre. It was beautiful and warm and sunny and I love Italy. For so many reasons. I'll link up to Tim's pictures when he gets them together. I could ramble on and on about Italy, so I'll cut it off here.

Since then, I've been climbing with Carrie, running in the hills (during our fleeting periods of sunshine and warmth--as a side note, it has been a CRAP spring weather-wise but this week we finally got some continuous sun and warmth), and getting my mind ready for the great culture shift. Well, two of them really. The first being a summer back in the States, and from there moving on to South Korea.

Tomorrow, we begin a long weekend and our last trip from Turkey. We are heading over to Cairo to visit old friends from Colegio Americano. Yeah, it's just a long weekend. But when again in our lives will be able to go to Cairo for a long weekend???? No time soon, so we're taking the opportunity.

I'm starting to get a little sad about leaving Turkey. There are many things I didn't get to do and places I didn't have a chance to see. This has been such a warm, friendly, and beautiful place to be. A country of surprises in every way. We've also made so many wonderful friends here. It's the hardest part about this job. But bitter-sweet too because we are quickly amassing many close friends all over the Earth that we'll eventually meet back up with at some point.

Travel plans are coming together. We leave Turkey on June 22nd and will be in Boone until the July 4th weekend where we'll spend in DC and then it's on to Colorado for a week for me, two for Tim. The rest of our time will be split between Boone and Greenville as we try to spread ourselves around and on July 31st, we fly from Atlanta on one long-haul straight to Seoul.