One step closer!

This past weekend, my mom, Tristan, and I traveled to the St. Louis area to ship my car. What was supposed to be an overnight trip turned into a 5 day trip. Thanks to an impending ice storm, we decided to leave on Friday, instead of Sunday to beat it. Started Friday and it was a uneventful trip...well, until we reached our hotel.

I figured you can't go wrong going to a Holiday Inn Express, right? Yeah.....no. We got checked in and went to the room, to find no curtains on the windows and no bedding on the beds. We drug all of our stuff back downstairs to tell the front desk and go to Room #2....this one had curtains and bedding, plus a ladder and all kinds of cleaning supplies and a handyman to-do list. So we drug all of our stuff back downstairs and checked out and drove to the next exit and found another Holiday Inn Express. Luckily they had a great lady working at the front desk, so got a discount off the military discount for the night's stay, plus they kept the pool open late for Tristan to go swimming. So, it made up for the first hotel. Tristan was very excited to see curtains on the windows, cause "he likes his privacy."

Left the next morning to get to St. Louis. Lots of rain and wind, but we made it there in one piece! Just hung around the hotel on Saturday and left sightseeing til Sunday.



A BRIDGE OVER THE MISSISSIPPI RIVER

We ended up going to the Arch and the City Museum. Not many people at either place, which was nice. Took the tram to the top of the Arch and got to see out the top. Tristan was scared out of his mind. He was afraid that the Arch would fall or that the tram would get stuck and we couldn't get out. After the complaining and being scared, we got off and he thought it really wasn't that bad! LOL



THIS WAS AFTER WE WENT TO THE TOP



VIEWS FROM THE TOP

We then went to the City Museum...definitely unlike any other place I've been. A series of caves, tunnels, slides, stairs, and paths for kids and adults to roam around. There were several spots that I couldn't fit into, and you never knew where the path would lead, so it limited Tristan in where he could go. The last thing I needed was for him to wonder off in some huge museum! The St. Louis circus school also had a show there, so got to see some teenagers and kids performing circus acts...juggling, unicycles, and on bikes. There was this tiny little 5 year old doing tricks too. It was pretty impressive.

Finally on Monday morning, I was able to get my car turned in. I was pretty nervous about getting it turned in, but I was worried for nothing, as it went so smooth. We have gotten so much misinformation about this move and it is quite frustrating. After driving for 9 hours the last thing I wanted was to get there and be told that I didn't have the right paperwork or we weren't authorized to ship from that particular port. Fort Benning told me one thing and after contacting the St. Louis VPC, I find that I was given the wrong information. With any luck, by the time we get to Germany, the car will be waiting for us! I suppose we will find out just how fast it can go on the Autobahn! :)

All day Monday, we were trying to keep up to date on the weather. We had Grandma calling us telling how bad it was and where the accidents were. Missouri was windy, but by the time we hit Iowa there were cars in the ditch left and right. I think we counted 40 cars/SUVs/semis in the ditch in less than 30 miles. It was wild. Many of them were flipped on their roof or on their side and they seemed to be in groups. By the time we got into Omaha, it was windy and snowy and the roads in Iowa and SD were really bad, so we ended up staying the night in Omaha. We finally got home yesterday, and it is so good to be home!

Now our latest issue is the No-fee passports- do we get them, don't we get them. Can we travel to Germany without them or do we have to wait til they are ready? No one can really tell us the right answer. It is another thing that has to be done on post. So, it will have to get done once we get to Fort Benning next month for Chris' graduation.

Some exciting news came over the weekend, when we found out that some of our good friends will also be stationed in Germany. So now I have someone else going through the process as well and we are able to help each other out with things. It will be so fun being able to do things with another great Army family!