He's home!!

Well, the moment we were waiting for all year finally happened on Jan 9, 2012.....Ben finally got to come home after being stationed in Korea for ONE WHOLE YEAR! This is a picture of the kids waiting for him at the airport. Everyone is so happy he is home....including him! Ben took a few weeks of leave and is just now getting back to work at his new job here at Scott AFB. He will be the lead vehicle maintenance inspector for the IG; he is very excited about this job and he will be traveling quite a bit (although we can handle a couple of weeks to a month every now and then over a year anyday).

The night he got home, he had to open his Christmas presents ;)

A week after Ben got home, him and I took a five day get away trip so we could reconnect! Don't laugh when I tell you where we went. The whole idea was to just get away...together.....even if it were down the street. So, Ben looked around and found a great old hotel in Dubuque, Iowa....and that is where we went. It was right on the border of Illinois, Iowa, and Wisconsin. And niether one of us had ever been to Iowa or Wsiconsin and we like to explore new places. So, here is a picture of Ben having a nice relaxing beer on our trip........

The hotel we stayed at was called the Hotel Julien named after Julien Dubuque, the founder of Dubuque, Iowa. This hotel was 150 years old and has recently been remodeled. It was beautiful and our room had a big jacuzzi tub right in it. They even had the most plush, comfy robes for us to wear while we were guests. The hotel had a spa in the basement and we enjoyed a couples massage together (this was Ben's first and I think he will have more;). It was SO cold while we were there, but we still had fun exploring the area, we just decided to skip the snow skiiing we had planned to do. We also forgot our snow boots, so the next day, we went to the mall and bought some. We are so glad we did, because we LIVED in them for the rest of the week.

Here you can see Ben....or can you tell it is him? That frozen river behind him is the great Mississippi!

After just getting out of the car for a 2 minute photo shoot, our hands and faces were F.R.O.Z.E.N! The Mississippi was behind us here, but we didn't have the tripod piece that hooked the camera to it, so we had to just set it up on the wall that was there.

On our adventures, we drove to a little town called McGregor, Iowa. This is the town my Grandpa (mothers daddy) and Great Uncle Dick grew up in. I had never been here before and it was so neat to visit. What a cute little town.

Just across the river, we drove through Prairie du Chien, Wisconsin. While in Wisconsin, we bought a ton of cheese and had lunch in a great little town called Shullsburg, Wi. I had a 6 cheese grilled cheese sandwhich and cheese soup! Yummy.... I ♥ Cheese!

During our travels, our car got very dirty!

This photo was taken in Galena, Illinois. What a cute little town. We shopped at the little shops and bought some great sauces at the Galena Canning Company. We got some yummy BBQ sauces, rubs, salsa, and jellies! We also made our own candles at a place in the little town.

This photo was what we ended up driving home in. It was awful and Ben didn't think my idea to just stay another day was any good. Warm cushy hotel, great company, some more wine..... I thought it was a great idea;) We drove for a couple of hours in weather like this, and then the last two hours before we arrived home, we drove on one big sheet of ice! Very dangerous! In a matter of 1 hour, we saw 12 different accidents/jack knifed big rigs/and people in ditches.

Oh, and we found some dirt with the jeep the other day...just had to share;)