The Adventure Begins…

Hello! Welcome to Brittany McAnally (Website/ Blog). I have been working on this website/blog for way too long! With the BIG move to Europe (Slovenia), I thought I should put my butt into gear and work on it. I thought this would be a GREAT way for our family and friends to keep up with our travels worldwide (we’re super excited). I also thought this would be a GREAT way to help other FAO (Foreign Area Officer) spouses understand how our IRT (In-Region Training) went.

You should also note that this blog is my photography portfolio, my random project site, and my virtual assistant business… can you tell I don’t like to sit still? I also don’t like having a million websites/blogs/ and different logins. So I’m going to make this one-stop-shop work! So bare with me!

Okay, let’s start with our BIG MOVE! All I have to say is, OH MY GOODNESS! Never in a million years would I have thought there was so much involved in moving to another country! Let me break it down for ya! If you’re not an FAO wife or a military spouse, just stop reading here (super long and tedious)

1. Tourist passport (Not an issue super easy!). Make sure NOT to get your pictures done at Costco because you WILL have to return and start over! Getting a tourist picture was easy it was the official passport picture that had to be PERFECT! No shadows, crystal clear, no smile!
2. Get medically approved to live overseas. This one was a little tricky; the boys had to have an overseas exam before they were due for a well-baby. Suppose you’re familiar with Tricare (Army insurance). In that case, you just have to call Tricare, give them a heads up that you need an overseas exam, and have a copy of your husband’s RFO (Request for orders) or actual orders attached to the insurance claim (Super easy). Now, for the tricky part… me! I have a hypothyroid and have to take a pill every day, so this flagged me for EFMP. I had to have my doctor fill out multiple forms explaining that I was okay to move overseas and that a simple family doctor could take care of me. Sounds a lot easier than it actually was!
3. We then had to meet with the Army medical officer to release us; once this happened we could then get our actual orders (yay).
4. We are moving to Slovenia, a country with little American military presence (basically none). We are not in the embassy pool, meaning housing is 100% on us. Sounds easy, but there’s a catch! We must find a house that meets all of the embassy’s security requirements. This has proven to be a challenge, to say the least. It’s a BIG list of requirements, 5 pages from extra locks to having a 360 perimeter fence. We’ve been lucky and have had a lot of help from the embassy. The previous Slovenian IRT family has also been a HUGE help. (If you are an FAO spouse and you are not in the embassy pool, just message me, this is way too hard of a process to even try to write in a paragraph)
5. Our dog! Poor Clarence will not be with us in Slovenia… so Clarence is heading to Oklahoma for a year to help out on the horse farm. We are so grateful to have family willing to help us for one year. We will miss him so much, but we know he will be in good hands.
6. Moving trucks! Ah!!! We have to figure out quickly what needs to go in our air shipment and what’s going on the boat for the long trip across the Atlantic. So far, on our air shipment, I have -Pots and pans -Blankets -Toys – Peanut butter (Europe doesn’t have it) -Towels, and whatever else I can put in a 3×3 box under 1000lbs! Pray for me, haha
7. Planning for the Airplane trip with two kids! Ah (AGAIN)!!! This will be a whole blog post in itself. I plan on writing what I packed and how I packed it. I then plan on writing a second post on how I survived the plane ( and what actually worked… I’m terrified to bring Heath on the aircraft (He’ll be two). Nolan, I can negotiate with Heath is a wild card! He’s really well behaved, but still, he’ll almost be 2, and that’s just a hard age to keep still. I know it will all work out; we survived driving from Tennessee to California. We will be fine; it’s just the thought that’s terrifying. To be continued…

I plan on keeping up with this blog (unlike my unsuccessful other blog…) I hope to see you back, and if you have any questions, please contact me at brittany@brittanymcanally.com