Thanksgiving Roadtrip!

By the time Brian's parents let from their visit it was a 2 week countdown till Thanksgiving! I left the following weekend to AZ to visit friends as well as plan a 3 day drive back to MS in my little VW Jetta. It was a big trip to plan but everything went safely and I even had the pleasure of having a riding buddy for the trip;. My mom was able to make the loooong drive from AZ to MS with me and it was awesome!


We left Wed before Thanksgiving and started our rive that night right as mom left work at 5pm. We actually made it all the way to Albuquerque that night an quickly found a hotel to pass out at. Alb to east Dallas was the trip for Thanksgiving day and man, was that a long day. Texas is HUGE!!! We literally felt like we were not making any progress that day because we really didn't pass through any boarders. But it was nice and by 5pm on Friday we had left TX and passed through LA and arrived home to Meridian. Our butts were definitely numb. Here are some roadtrip pics!


 Mom commandeering the car:

Thanks a lot mom

The Mississippi River Yay!!

Almost there:

 Home!!

It was really nice to be back home. Brian even made mom an I dinner! The visit was a pretty restful one except for our Thanksgiving inner ay. Since mom and I were on the road for the holiday we decided to do the dinner a little later in the week and have it Sunday. It was kind of a long process to feed a total if three people but it was nice and tasty!

Hello Meridian!

We arrive in Meridian,  MS safely and are now settling in. We actually unpacked our boxes and organized the house a lot faster than before; but that probably has to do with the size of the house we move into on base. Our house is amazing!! We feel so blessed to be in this sort or house so early in our marriage. The house is 3 bedrooms with 2 baths an a TON of closet space. So everything that is not unpacked is in a closet, making the place look great ;)

Immediately after we moved into our new house we started having guests and family in it. Brian's parents visited us for the weekend and although it was a short trip it was really fun for everyone to get together and for them to see where we are living now. Here are some pictures from their visit.



 Going for a walk at the Squadron's Hanger:

T45...the plane Brian will soon fly!

 Went for a walk in the wilderness near our house:

Goodbye Enid

After a long and challenging process of academics, early morning flights and the dreaded simulator flights the Cobra class that I have come to know and love very much are finally done. They completed this phase of training and are now already assigned their next "tracks" they are to follow in the aviation community. Specifically for Brian and another Navy friend of ours, they got the track of the T45.

This means Brian is officially guaranteed "tailhook" aircraft by the US Navy. He will one day be landing on an aircraft carrier daily and be getting paid to do so. His ultimate goal is the F 18 and hopefully through a little more training he will be able to obtain that goal. By being selected to the T45 track, Brian and I will be moving to NAS Meridian, Mississippi.  We already have orders to be there by the end of the month and a class date by the end of next month. So this week we will be have movers move our little apartment's belongings into a large 18 wheeler truck and start it's way down there ahead of us. We will later follow with some belongings and arrive into MS within a week from now.


When we get to MS we actually don't officially have a place to stay but this is another one of those military familiarities you learn to be flexible with. It's really not a problem because Brian and I now know we officially will have an on base house reserved for us to move into on Nov 7th. Although we are not moving into it right away it's nice to know that it will eventually be open for us :) Brian and I are really excited to be moving into our first house. God even blessed us with a big house, it's 3 bedrooms! We will definitely be setting up a guest room and an office, who knows we may not have enough stuff to fill it out (obviously not the same problem we have here in our current apt.) Once into our house Brian will soon be starting his t45 training and before we know it I am sure we will be thrown into the holidays and living happily in our new little house. 


Although we are happy to be moving on to the next place, we will miss a little bit of Enid. Mainly the people we've met and grown to really like and know. Sure, Brian and I have more Air Force knowledge than Navy due to our current assignment but it's been pretty fun. We have had some really great times with friends and will definitely remember all of them. Thanks everyone in Enid for making it one of the friendliest places I've visited!

Enid

(I apologize for not writing for a while...I no longer have a computer (it died) and now share with Brian. So here it goes).


We've been in Enid for nearly 12 weeks and in our apartment for nearly 10. And now that we are pretty settled we've found out it's time to move! More to come on that...


But I thought it might be nice to post some photos from the local area so you could see what we see :]


Enid has a real nice downtown district that begins with a Welcome Center:

There is the main park as you drive into Enid  and this building is at it's edge that I thought looked nice:

 Here is Callahan's a local bar most of our friends and I go to on Thurs night for the Trivia game

 This is more downtown area:

 Probably the tallest building in Enid. It's not too big but it does stand out.

 This is the surrounding shops and restaurants that are on the outside edge of the downtown square.

 In the central square they have some historical sites that describe Oklahoma's history and it starts with the Indians.

 I told Brian we could take a picture in the Teepee and this is how it came out haha

 Here is me in the teepee

 In the central square there is a gazebo that has a time capsule that is not to be open till 2086

 The square is mainly a park where you could sit on a bench and enjoy the day

 Here is a statue also depicting Enid history.

There are 3 parts to the statue, past, present and future. First the cowboy who established the town by being part of the "sooner" group and claiming land in Enid as his own

 The present is represented by Air Force pilot who established Vance Air Force base and as a result helped the town boom due to the base's activity. (Notice the TWO pilots in the picture)

The future is represented by the first woman astronaut to be apart of the space station who graduated from Vance AFB also in Enid.

 Here is "The Keeper of the Plains" statue of the representative Indian who was to protect the area.

 We saw a man atop of this building and got a little scared until we realized he was fixing the antenna. It was way too windy to be up there!!

And a butterfly!

Away from the downtown square, Enid is your average town with one main drag. This is our main road called Owen K. Garriott, pictured here:

Here is the nice turn off from Garriott onto Oakwood Rd. where we happily reside:

And here is the first place we went when we arrived into Enid on that cold Feb night:

Brian's Solo Tie Cut Party

In the NAVY (not an Air Force tradition and may we add that they took it from the Navy), when a pilot first solos an aircraft they have a get-together of the pilots and instructors of the flight to celebrate the event. They make it an entertaining event because the student wears a tie to the party and their instructor tells the (usually comical) story how the solo day went and how well (or not so well) the student did. Depending on the soloist's success the instructor will cut a certain amount of that tie. A bad solo means the tie will be cut a lot, possibly even to the knot. A good solo results in only a little or even just the tip of the tie being cut. Here are some pictures from the fun day...

Brian and his instructor Capt. Freedman

Brian's solo story wasn't very "funny" but he was said to be a great student (second in the class!!) The instructor really had no worries about soloing with him despite the fact that he hadn't even flown with Brian before (this is very rare!!)

The official tie cutting! It's just the tip of the tie!! Good job Brian!!

 

After the tie is cut the student gives their name tag to the instructor so when they hang up what they cut off on their wall the student's name is displayed with it.

Capt Freedman's first Navy solo student was Brian so it was definitely going on his wall!

Brian with his solo certificate :)

After the little party and everyone's tie was cute Brian was able to take me to the flight line! But not before I got to try on more of his cool pilot equipment ;)

Me on the flight line in front of a T6 (Brian's trainer aircraft)

Some pictures of us :]