Back in the U.S.A.

Nick celebrating a belated Christmas
with the Detroit crew.

It has been 14 months since we left the shores of Maryland to join the Caribbean 1500 Rally to Tortola! Even though we love the adventure, we do miss our children and grandchildren and our landlubber friends. So we decided to take a flight around the world to see them all. We saw the London family in Germany so now it is back to the USA to see the Detroit and San Francisco families. Fortunately, Nick, who is in Portland, OR finishing his PhD in Chemistry, will join us in Detroit.

Vicki & Larry Florida -bound

Our promise to be back for Addison's eight birthday is one that we must keep so the trip was designed around that special day. She also wanted Grammy there for her birthday party with friends. I had to watch the DVD of Frozen to know what the 15 little girls were excited to see. Her party entertainment was Snow Queen Elsa and Snowman Olaf from the movie and the girls seem to know every word of every song from the movie.

Grand D with our newest guy Henry in San Francisco

We celebrated New Year's Eve at the club with my sister and her husband who were on their way to Florida to get out of the frozen north! We were treated to wonderful hospitality by our friend Loretta who offered us her home while in Detroit. We loved being in a house so I could cook in a real kitchen and I think Loretta enjoyed coming home to a prepared dinner!

Most of our days were filled with appointments: doctors, dentists, accountants, financial advisers, bankers, etc. Then we shared our evening meals with various friends and family members. It was exhausting getting everything done and seeing everyone, but well worth the effort. We call it the Four F's: Family, Friends, Finances and F(Ph)ysicians! One of the highlights was having lunch with our home parish priest, Monsignor Lentine who is 95 or 96 and still overseeing the parish! He is a very special person. And he and Dennis share a birthday.



 

Henry with parents Krystal and Jon

Next we headed to California to see Tanner and Henry, the newest grandchild. We had the opportunity to babysit all day with seven month old Henry. What a happy baby! We had a great time with Tanner (5) and had many good snuggles. The best part of all was just being together with Jon and Krystal, Ben and Sue, and niece Beverly and Dean for several dinners

He arrived early, but is catching up fast! Happy Baby.

Tanner showing SF to Grand D

.

What a sweet little boy.

We did some sightseeing in San Francisco, but spent most of our daytime while everyone was at work or school setting up new computers, iPads, iPhones and other technology. It is so expensive to do the downloading offshore or in other countries. Also it is nice to be able to call the HELP line when we got stumped!



Ben and Sue with Tanner and Jon

We will leave San Francisco for Sydney and then Auckland the last week of January. We plan to return to Portland, OR in June when Nick goes through his PhD Cloaking Ceremony. Then we will have to call him Dr. Nick! We are very proud of him.