A Return Home...

After 15 months in Naples, Italy, Sara and I have returned home to Alaska for the winter. Though we truly enjoyed our time in Italy, we're thrilled to be home once again; not only back in Alaska, but also back in the United States! God Bless America!

It's obviously been a very long time since we've updated our blog, so hopefully this brief, yet detailed posting gets everyone caught up enough to feel "reconnected" with the Bryans :)

The most important event of our lives is 'due' to arrive any day now! Sara and I are expecting our first baby in the very near future! In fact, Sara's due date was yesterday! With that being said, if you don't see any postings over the next year or so following this blog, we've likely chosen to prioritize in a way that precludes blogging. Hopefully we will manage to keep up while also parenting, though I'm not too optimistic. Either way, we will at least post picture of our little son as soon as he gets here.

On 15 December we left Naples. I was on the road a lot during that tour, but thankfully Sara traveled with me at every opportunity. After multiple deployments in Yokosuka, Japan and Everett, Washington, being in Europe with Sara was a wonderful experience. We enjoyed getting to know our temporary home, wonderful neighbors and got to see so much of that part of the world. We got to spend our first week back in the States with the Bryans in Wyoming for Christmas, then departed for 10 weeks of temporary assignment as an Officer Recruiter in Anchorage.

Now we start the next phase in our life... We depart in mid-March for 2 years of graduate school at the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, California. We look forward to meeting some new friends and being together as a family (all three of us!) without the interruptions of deployments and business travel. Following grad school we will head to Newport, Rhode Island for 6 months of training before being assigned to our new duty station onboard one of 286 US Navy warships stationed around the world.

Our time in Alaska has been truly wonderful. We've enjoyed reconnecting with old friends, frequenting the Wilson's cabin north of Anchorage, and going on long walks around the city... and with Anchorage's 120 miles of groomed trails, it's been a treat! Needless to say, we've also reconnected with the local coffee shops around town (especially Kaladi's & George's cafe downtown) and I recently had the pleasure of enjoying a breakfast of french toast, reindeer sausage and eggs at Gwennie's Old Alaska Restaurant with my good friend Ryan (who flew in for 48 hours prior to his upcoming deployment)! It's been great to have family and friends come up to visit us over the past couple weeks (all with the hopes of meeting baby Bryan), but it's been especially great to know that both of our mom's will be in town to meet their new grandson next week!

Please check in with us from time to time and we'll try to keep this blog updated with pictures of our new little guy and our new home in Monterey.

God bless,

Grant & Sara

Everybody Wants to Love

If you want to smile, try taking a listen to Ingrid Michaelson's "Everybody" here.

~Sara

MUSH!

Saturday, 3/6 is the ceremonial start of the Iditarod in downtown Anchorage and Sunday, 3/7 is the official restart in Willow. It is one of Alaskan's favorite local events and is also world re-known!

Watch live video and follow each individual musher on the official Iditarod web site if you are interested!

Twirl

I (Sara) have recently started substitute teaching at the Anglo-Italian International School on the NATO base here in Naples. My degree and employment background are in Human Resources and business management, but I've been enjoying this fun change of pace, environment and challenges! My Mom taught for about 35 years (right, Mom?) and I've always looked up to her for her ability to communicate with children, respect them and teach them. So it's fun for me to get a glimpse of what she did every day and the energy it required!

So the reason I'm writing this post...a little girl in class twirled today and it made my day! I've really enjoyed chatting with kids from different countries in each class and they all have some of the same core perspectives and behavior tendencies. There are children from Italy, Turkey, Germany, Spain, America, France, etc. This week I've been teaching a class of 5th graders. Today one little girl walked over to ask me a question and when we finished talking she turned and twirled back to her desk. She didn't walk, she twirled. It made me smile!

Sonthofen, Germany

Another work trip that ended up being truly fun and relaxing for us both. The boss held a conference in Sonthofen, Germany for his Commanding Officers and their staffs. We stayed at the Algau Stern Hotel about 2 hours south of Munich (just a couple miles North of Austria). The view was truly amazing. It snowed the 2nd night we were there, so we got to enjoy some nice walks in another winter wonderland! It was very relaxing and the food was amazing! The hotel provided all three meals in the form of an endless buffet. It was fun to hang out with people from work along with their spouses, and of course truly a blessing to spend time together!! Though the job comes with lots of travel, it seems worth it when we get to spend time together and NOT DEPLOYED!

Carnival in Venice

I'm convinced there's no place on earth like Venice. History, culture, food, romance... it was awesome. We went during the Carnavale celebration... which might not have been the best time to visit, but ended up being fun. Thousands of people rushed to St. Marco's Square where most of the festivities took place. Fire shows, costumes, incredibly long lines, great vendors, fun shopping... and of course amazing food! Valentine's Evening was spent enjoying complimentary Champagne at our Bed and Breakfast which was about a 5 minute walk from the center of town. Everything in Venice was elaborate and expensive, but still very romantic.

For more photos, click here.

East Coast Winter Wonderland

We traveled to Washington D.C. in late January for some meetings at the Pentagon and I was able to bring Sara with me! American soil was more wonderful than we we would. DC is such a great city. Needless to say, there were lots of visits to Starbucks and a wonderful stay with friends in Annapolis :) We spent the weekend playing games watching the snow fall and exploring Annapolis. We had lunch at the Sly Fox (a favorite for both of us) and even got to enjoy a burger at Cheeburger Cheeburger!

We were planning to drive to North Carolina to visit Sara's Aunt and Uncle, but it snowed almost 14 inches on Friday night, so we were pretty much got snowed in for the weekend. Sara flew to North Carolina on Sunday instead shortly before I departed for Bahrain that evening. We're hoping to get back to the East Coast soon to see family and enjoy some more time exploring.