Picture Post of Pre-deployment!

Leslie is the one on the right, Kasia is in the middle (the one from Poland). We went wandering downtown for lunch one day and actually ended up finding a Polish Pottery shop that was pretty kick butt and authenticity was varified by Kasia. I dragged Brian back there a few days later and he bought me a salt and pepper shaker set :)

Off to the Zoo! Brian had block leave for two weeks, the first half was taken up with a "mandatory jump" (yup, they were technically on leave and still had to come to work) and then visiting his family in VA, the second half was spent all over Fayetteville, Raleigh, and even to the Zoo! Definitely a good time, and surprisingly shady for the vast majority of the walking route to see all the animals.

YAY Giraffe! I took multiple pictures of the giraffes, but I'll refrain from posting them all here :)

The Polar Bear was one of Brian and I's favorites. He looks too cute all sprawled out in the shade. I actually donated a dollar and got a button to support the expansion of the polar bear enclosure. Apparently they have two male polar bears but not enough space for both of them.

Ocelot Kitten! There were two kittens and a mom, they were super cute. This one has just spotted his littermate ttying to sneak up on him. The drama took several minutes to unfold, but once the sneaker realized he'd been spotted he noncholantly pretended he wasn't doing anything suspicious, and the sneaked upon (kitten in the picture) went back to playing on his branch.

At the end of Brian's block leave we headed over ot the Vincent's for a family picnic. John and Rachel made the trip from Texas and Matthew was able to come before he started his adventure in Indiana. I baked and decorated the cake for the occasion and it turned out not too shabby :) 

First time I had really attempted the layered approach, the top actually says "Let's Celebrate!"

My super cute niece! Brian snagged this photo when I wasn't looking, but it turned out to be one of my favorites. She's so big!

I meant to post more but the computer is being flakey about uploading my pictures so I guess I'll have to do a "Part 2" at a later date :)