Italian Adventure with the Bemi!!!

Dave and I are back from Italy after a lot of traveling one week. We had sooo much fun visiting with Carrie and Joe and Carlie!!! We took over 200 pictures so I posted them on snapfish so let me know if I did not send you the link. Our trip went like this: we arrived in Venice on Sunday evening (we spent Easter on planes and in the Frankfurt Airport) and Carrie picked us up at the airport. After about a one hour drive we made it to her house. It is very beautiful with marble floors, beautiful coloring and it's very spacious. We ate some leftovers from brunch (which was great after traveling so much!). We played outside with Carlie and just enjoyed visiting. On Monday morning Dave and I woke up super early (like 3:30 AM) and went upstairs and ate pancakes then went back to bed for a few hours. Carrie and Joe took us to Lake Barcis which is about 30 minutes from there home in the mountains. It was beautiful and the water was turquoise. Here is a picture of us at the lake.




Tuesday we got up and started our car adventure to Cinque Terre. The area is on the west side of Italy and it is 5 towns (population appr. 600-900 people) built into the coastline. Along the way Carrie, Carlie and of course myself fell asleep. For me it was a coping method for not getting nauseous on the winding roads. We arrived in Monterroso and checked into the bed and breakfast. The views were breath taking. Here are a few from our patio as well as from our hike around the town (and Carlie and spaghetti).










On Wednesday, we started a one and a half hour hike from the town we were staying in to the next town. Carlie looked very cute in the backpack with Joe:) The hike was beautiful. Joe was definity a trooper for carrying Carlie the entire day! The weather was wonderful and we could not have asked for a better day. Dave and I did some "rock jumping" from about eight feet up into the cold sea. We hiked between two other towns and took the train or boat to see the others. It was a long day with a lot of walking, but it was really neat and all the towns were really cute.









Thursday we drove back. It took about eight hours with a few short stops in Verona and a small town called Soave to see a super neat castle. On Friday we took a quick tour of Aviano AFB and then Dave and I took a train to Venice. We then took a bus from the train station to our hotel, which is actually outside of Venice, and we got lost because someone told us to get off the bus early and we ended up walking a few miles with our heavy backbacks on asking Italians who spoke no English how to get to our hotel. We did finally find it, and we dropped our backpacks off and took another bus into Venice and spent about five hours walking around. We slept for a few hours then got on a shuttle at 5 AM to the airport for the long trip home.









On our way back we had to go through customs in Dallas. We had to pick up our bags, clear customs, then recheck our bags and make it to our gate in about an hour and 15 minutes from the time our plane landed until our next plane took off. We were literally running through the airport to make it. When we went to re-check our bags, they wouldn't let us because there was only about 20 minutes until our flight took off, so we ran and carried our bags on after throwing away some liquids. We did just make the flight, but that was a fun adventure in itself.

Overall, it was a whirlwind trip but we really enjoyed spending time with the Bemi and seeing a lot of beautiful sites in Italy.

Party Time!!!

We went to the Rio with some friends to celebrate Dave's birthday and the success of finishing his first set of boards!!! It was a great night. Now, we leave for Italy!!! Woot Woot:)

Getting Pumped...

Dave has 2 more days of studying then on Friday he takes his big exam!! Please pray for his patience and concentration as the exam is 8 hours long on Friday. He will also be turning 24 on Friday! We are planning dinner and drinks at the Rio with some friends. Then on Saturday afternoon we will be flying out to ITALY!!! I am getting pumped for our trip!! I just thought everyone should know what going on in the Otten household :)

Quick trip to Virginia...

Well, bad news hit the Otten Family when David's Grandma on his mom's side passed away on Wednesday. We booked a flight out to Virginia and left on Friday and stayed until Monday afternoon. The funeral was on Saturday and David's dad gave the eulogy for his mother in law. It was a wonderful speech and and he focused mainly on the fun, humorous side of Grandma Finney. Visiting with the extended family was nice since we do not go out there very often.

One of the best things we were able to do was visit the USS George H. W. Bush Aircraft Carrier. It is at the Navel Base in Norfolk. Dave's cousin's husband was in the Navy and is stationed on the ship. He was able to give us an amazing tour of the huge ship! Tip to tip it is as tall as the Empire State Building.

The Ship!


This is where Kyle Sleeps! Yikes!


Very Patriotic! On the flight deck.


Giant Anchor Chains...


The Captains Chair...




Amazing....

Brewery Tours, Fort Collins, CO

We took our friend Gina to the breweries in Fort Collins. She is from Oklahoma, so she had never been to New Belgium (home of Fat Tire), Fort Collins Brewery, or O'Dells (home of Easy Street). We had a great time. Kailey and Bryan came with us, so it was a cute "Otten" affair. I also added a few pictures of Dave and his friends at karaoke. We dressed up one night and had a great time making fools of ourselves a the bar.









Oh and here is a super cute picture that is totally unrelated. Asher has been Dave's study partner as he has been preparing for his boards. Apparently she is getting tired and can't keep her eyes open on all the paper :)

Italy here we come....

Big news: we leave for Italy in about 5 weeks..... Yes Italy.



Dave and I were planning a trip to Mexico before he starts work in the hospital, but thanks to mom and dad, they warned us about the growing violence with our neighbors to the south. I guess I have not been watching the news closely enough because we had no clue about the drug cartel and other violence that has been happening. Thanks Mom and Dad for keeping us in the loop:) Well, Dave and I threw around quite a few ideas about what else we should do with that week, but we kept coming back to Italy. It will be a short trip since we will be there for one week, but we may never have much more time than that to travel. We are VERY excited to visit Carrie, Joe and CARLIE!!! I laugh at our decision because it seems that Dave and I like make big decisions in short amounts of time... we have been procrastinating on making a decision about Mexico (which I am glad we did), but now we are leaving for Italy in 5 weeks:) Oh well, we are very excited and got a good deal on airfare to Europe. Also, we are excited because we are flying on Lufthansa Airlines which is known for great service, little TV's in the head rests and free alcohol.

Also, a reminder that Dave takes his boards exam on April 10th, so keep him in your thoughts and prayers as he prepares for this major test!!

Ice Fishing

Gwen and I went ice fishing today after church in Evergreen. It was a beautiful day, about 55 degrees, but the ice was solid. We had a fun time, and caught four fish.


Here I am attempting to use the agar to drill the hole, but it turns out we just used holes that were already drilled since it was such a wonderful day. Not to mention it saved us a lot of work:)



Gwen just relaxing with her pole.


Look at that bad boy!



Our feast!!!