Another Frankfurt Trip

I just got back from Frankfurt again for my 5th time. This time I had no visitors, as my parents were in Rothenburg for the weekend, and no one else could make it. That's ok, tho'. I slept pretty rotten and sporadically, so if someone had been with me, we would have had to overcome that.
I've been doing the German language announcements now for 2 flights, and I HOPE I'm getting better. I really need to improve on my PA skills and comfort levels when my voice is carried over the whole airplane. It's very intimidating. Please pray for me in this area. Other than that, we'll see where the next trip takes me!

I'm going to be an AUNTIE!!!!!

Some of you have been questioning why I didn't take more pictures when I was with my WHOLE family. Well, the day I arrived home from Frankfurt with mom (see previous post for the story), I called Sharla, who was supposed to be arriving in San Francisco 2 days later. Unfortunately, because of her morning sickness (pray for her!), we decided to postpone the trip to San Fran for another time when she could actually enjoy it. So, we all went up to Seattle, and I only took one picture of all of us while I was there, in consideration for the future "Mum" who wasn't feeling well the rest of the time. That's why I don't have more pictures! :o ) And I'm ok with that, especially for such an extraordinary reason.
Oh,and I just flew to London and back for the 3rd time, but that's not NEARLY as exciting!

Back to Work. . .to Shanghai!

The next day I had to work. Guess where I flew?!! Frankfurt. Again. :o ) This was the view from my hotel window.

Meanwhile, mom and dad left California, and headed to Colorado for a quick visit with Dad's family. I had two days off after returning from Frankfurt, then was chosen to fly to Shanghai, China. Now, those of you who have kept up with my flying know that so much international flying does NOT happen all the time. I don't even know why it happened to me so much these last two months, but I'm thankful. The hotel in Shanghai was an hour and 1/2 drive away from the airport, which was not too nice after working such a long flight (around 12 1/2 hours). I was so ready to sleep after that, it was incredible. The next morning, I met with two flight attendants and went to the international pearl market. I bought some beautiful pearl necklaces for $30. The prices were incredible. Not all stores were like that, however. I also looked at buying a cashmere sweater from a store. The girl there quoted me the same price that I buy one for here in the US. I left that store quickly, even though I could bargain with her. I just didn't want to do that.
I didn't take that many pictures of Shanghai. . .just two from my hotel window. To be honest, the city really wasn't that pretty to look at. There were so many highrises. To give you an example. . . .
I read in a magazine about Shanghai. Every 12 days a newly construted highrise is completed. That's a lot. BUT, this statistic has been happening for THE LAST 30 YEARS!!! So, if you do a little math, that's 30 highrises per year, and 900 for the last 30 years!!!! And that's just in one city. I'm telling you, if you've never seen that before, its almost overwhelming. Makes me thankful that I've had the pleasure of living on the wide, open spaces of the Prairies!

Family Vacation

When I got back from Frankfurt with mom, I still had to work for a couple days. I was able to fly to Orlando, Florida for the first time, which was pretty exciting. I was going to do some touring, but we got a thunderstorm right when we came in. I stayed at the hotel the whole time. Although, when I was waiting for my supper to be finished to take up to my room, I stepped out to the "garden" area of the hotel. The bartender was sure to warn me to "Watch out for 'gaters. We have some out there!" Needless to say, that kind of freaked me out from any real walking. Plus, I was so scared to walk by any bushes that I didn't stay long!
After returning from Orlando, our long awaited family gathering took place.

Then Dad, Mom and I went down to Watsonville, CA to visit a work team that had come to help at BFA this past summer. On our way there, we drove along the coast and got some fantastic pictures. I, of course, took my shoes off and waded in the water. Dad, however, decided to keep his shoes because he didn't know how to clean his feet. Well, long story short, he should have taken them off. He was taking a picture, and a wave came up higher on the beach than he expected, and he got soaked!! :o ) I was laughing quite hard!!





Anyway, we had a wonderful time with the work team. The most fun was playing with three triplets: Jennifer, Hannah, and Heather. They were 4 years old and definitely the life of the party. This is dad playing horsey with all three of them at the same time . . . not an easy feat! I told him he was practicing his "Opa-ness" for when Shar's baby(s) comes.

We went to the Montery Bay Aquarium and were blessed to have some free passes that the people we stayed with had. We also went to see this little area where we went for a short walk for an hour or so. This was not far from their house, and had some fun places to see.
Here's mom and our hostess, Claudia, on the path. You can see dad in the background looking through binoculars, which we were able to borrow from the lodge. He liked that!

Here's mom and I sitting on one of the benches along the path. Nice view behind us!

We ended the day driving along the coast by Montery. It was beautiful.

"Where have you been?!!"

Ahh, the question of the hour. Well, as you knew from before, I was preparing for a visit from my parents here in San Francisco. I was able to get a total of 10 days off while they were here, with a couple days of work in between. Before I had those, however, I had to work. And where did I fly? London! Portland!! Frankfurt!!! Here's how the story went . . . .
My trip to London was actually the second time I'd had a chance to go there. It was another beautiful day there (which, from what I hear, can be quite extraordinary), so I took some more pictures. You might have seen these or similar earlier, but why not some more?!!

This is me at the tower bridge in London.


This is a street near the bridge that I just thought looked pretty cool.

Another shot of me with the parliament buildings and Big Ben behind me. For some reason this shot turned out a little dark.


This gate is near Buckingham Palace. This park (I can't remember the name of it now) is actually surrounded by different gates like this. Each gate has the name of countries that Great Britain has ruled over. I took a picture by this particular one for one reason. . . .

. . .it's CANADA!!

After arriving back from London, I got to fly to Portland, OR, where I was able to meet up with my former roommate from training! She has since quit working with United and gone back to Portland. I got to meet her family, especially her little dog, whom she had mentioned many times when I was with her. :o )


My family and I had really been praying that I would get another trip to Frankfurt, even around the time they were coming, so that maybe one of them would be able to fly back with me. The day before I was scheduled to work, I looked on the list of trips that were open for the next day. There was a German-qualified person on sick list who had dropped their trip to Frankfurt. I looked on the reserve list. I was the only German speaker available for that trip on the reserve list.
So, I called mom. "Mom, I think you better prepare to come early to San Francisco." "Why?" she asked. "Because I'm almost 100% sure I am flying to Frankfurt TOMORROW!" This was three days earlier than she had planned to fly. I told her why I thought I would be flying there, and she started working on getting ready to come to Frankfurt. She joined me the afternoon I got there and stayed in this hotel with me.

We then tried to book her on my flight that I was working on the next evening. Things were not looking good as the flight was overbooked, and when that happens, going standby is not an option. Needless to say, God was in the process of answering our prayers. She got THE LAST SEAT on that airplane, and, although she wasn't able to watch me work very much, she still snuck up a little bit to see me in action during dessert in business class. We were going to take a picture of the two of us on the same airplane, but I completely forgot about it, and so did she. So, that is a memory only in our minds.