Back in the U.S.A.

We had a busy, but fun, trip to the U.S. in March. We spent one week in Seattle and one week in Atlanta. The reason we went to Seattle was because Rick’s brother, Mark, got married. The wedding was beautiful and so was the bride, Tina. It was great spending time with the Cohan family and meeting the friends and family of the bride—especially her three awesome daughters. There were a lot of festivities surrounding the wedding so we were always on the go.

Our week in Atlanta was even busier as we tried to visit with a lot of friends and family. Although we felt some of our visits were too brief and we ran around like chickens with our heads cut off, it was wonderful to see everyone and to learn about new and exciting things going on in their lives. The best surprise was when my sister and her 3-year old daughter, Emma, showed up at my grandfather’s house. They flew in from Virginia and stayed for several days. Apparently, my grandfather, Rick, and myself were the only ones in the dark about this. The only bad part was that my other niece and nephew were not able to be there. They would have missed too much school.

Most of our time in both locations was spent eating. What else do you do when you are visiting with people that you haven’t seen in a long time? We miss all of you, but we were feeling a bit bloated when we left Atlanta. We were happy to get back to our normal diet.

Besides the diet, we really didn’t experience much culture shock. We have not been away long enough. The only strange thing for me was hearing English spoken at the airport when we first landed in the U.S. I have gotten accustomed to hearing a lot of background noise, but not understanding much of what people say. It was kind of refreshing to know what people were saying. I wanted to eaves drop just because I could! Also, it took me a little while to remember to say, "excuse me" rather than "pardon-pronounced with a French accent" when trying to get by someone.