Big Agnes arrived. Unfortunately, we had to send her back for a replacement. Let me 'splain... as we gear up for this adventure, one of the necessary pieces of equipment is some sort of air mattress that packs down small, but will give us some relief as we sleep on the ground for 24 days in Africa. That's where Big Agnes comes in. That's the brand of air mattress that REI sells and gets rave reviews from all who use it (of course, the folks reviewing it aren't used to sleeping at the Omni, they're used to sleeping on the bare ground, so all things are relative). We ordered a couple of them a few weeks ago to be delivered to the Maple Grove store. Got there today and learned that one of them had apparently fallen into some grease before being shipped. If it was just dirt we would live with it. But grease... no thanks. So back it went. They promised they would send us a brand new one, delivered to our front door for no extra shipping. We've been pretty happy so far with REI, so I'm going to take them at their word for it. It's not the end of the world if we don't have it for Aus/NZ anyway. The more important timing is to have it for Stage 2. My sleep will also be much improved with my new sleep pillow. My sister-in-law, Beth, was kind enough to take one of my old really fabulous pillows, cut it down the middle and sew up, not one, but two travel pillows for me. She even cut down an old pillowcase of hers, so I have two tiny pillowcases for my two tiny pillows. How cute is that?

I also found the most fabulous undershirt. Long sleeves with a turtleneck and a front zipper. Perfect for us ladies who find ourselves swinging between freezing and boiling hot in the span of just a moment or two.

Jeff says he's going to start a spreadsheet to track just how much gear we've bought so far. I'm a little scared to see it. On the other hand, he is the one who is calling this our FIRST around the world trip. So we'll be prepared if we ever do this again.

Hoo boy. Just a week from tomorrow. It's getting exciting!