Brand new shiny wings

This was by far the BEST week here at Laughlin.  I got my wings and I had a bunch of family in town to share it with.  It can't get to mush better than that.

Kristen's parents got here on Tuesday night.  Kristen was able to get them settled in with their dog, Sandy, before the rush of everyone else was scheduled to get here.  It was kinda sad to think that this is probably the last time that they will make this 12 hour drive to come and visit us over here on the edge of nowhere.......ahhhhh....., good times, good times. Haha.

Kristen's mom has had a "regular" cell phone (like one with no alphabet keypad on it) forever now.  She has been complaining about it not working for a few weeks now so her and Kristen went down to the local AT&T store, yes we actually have one of those over here, and got her a new phone.  She got an iPhone 4!!! AAggghhhhhh!!!!!  She got one before Kristen or I... Ha!  We are both so jealous.  That thing is sweet!

My Dad, Mom, Mr. Bill, Mia, Matt, Paw, Uncle CJ and Ben all got in on Wednesday night and were pumped up for the next days events.

On Thursday is when all of the planned activities started.  It was also when the rest of the family was scheduled to get into Del Rio (Grandpa, Aunt Cindy, Aunt Cathy and Uncle Jimmy).  I was trying to quickly organize a lunch with the whole family seeing that this would be our first meal together in Del Rio and I was excited that we were now all here together!  But I soon realized how hard it is to "quickly" organize 14 people to do what you want them to do.  It makes me appreciate the military structure where the commander says a command and there is no questions asked and the troops find a way to get it done.  haha.  My family is obviously not in the military because this did not happen at all!  My dad, uncle  and cousin went to eat lunch at Silver Wings, a base eatery.  Myself, Kristen, Kristen's Mom and Dad, my Mom, Mr. Bill, Paw, Sister and Matt all went to eat a Julio's Mexican restaurant.  And finally my Grandpa, Aunt Cindy, Aunt cathy and Uncle Jimmy went to eat at some other place in town.  AAggghhhh!!!  I soon found out that the next few days might be a little tough unless I just tell everyone what will be happening and just hope that the little ducks fall in line. Haha.

I had a T-1 simulator reserved for 2 1/2 hours for my family.  It was a really special circumstance because the rest of the class just had one hour of time for their family.  But since I had 14 guests my classmates gave me all the "extra" time that our class had allotted.  So that was really nice of them.  But even with all of my bartering and begging for the extra time I still had people in my group who kept asking me about more sim time....over and over.  I don't think that they realized how hard I had to work just to get us what we had already.  Oh well.  I'm sure that everyone there enjoyed our precious 2 1/2 hours of time in the sim. Again, this makes me happy that I am in the military and now even more I realize why we have a chain of command.  It's so the same question does not keep coming up and the same answer keep given out.  If you just go through your chain of command the person in charge could worry about making everything run smooth and not repeating themselves.  It all is really making sense now. Haha.

In the sim we had a GREAT time though.  I stayed in the co-pilots seat for the most part.  And family members swapped out in the pilots seat for the flying duties.  We did a bunch of landings, flew in a formation with a KC-10, re-fueled with a KC-10, flew down the Vegas strip, Grand canyon, and finally finished the sim with a few emergency malfunctions to show off my skills.  Haha.  A few of my family members actually did a really good job flying and landing.  Of course we were just flying....no radio calls, airspace or rules to worry about.

Later that afternoon we had a retreat ceremony.  Basically it was the national anthem with a flyover.

After that we went to "Border Buttermilk" at the O-Club.  It was a small ceremony to give our IP's and base agencies awards.  It also was a good ice breaker for all of the families and a good opportunity for some of us got some alcohol in us. Haha.

After Border Buttermilk Kristen and I brought everyone to Rudy's BBQ.  We love that place!  I think everyone else loved it also.

The next day, Friday, was the big day.  I started out the day with a breakfast with Kristen and my parents.  And then we went to the graduation.  My whole family was there and dress up...., it was nice.  They called my name, I walked across the stage and they gave me my wings.  Holy crap!  We did it!  I'm a pilot in the USAF!  Ha!  I was so proud.

After that we went outside for pictures.  Kristen broke my first set of wings (for good luck) and pinned on the next set.

After pictures we all went upstairs to Silver Wings for some lunch.  Then I took some of us around my old squadrons for a quick tour.  then we went on a guided tour of aerospace phys (altitude chamber), RAPCON (radar approach control), and the tower.  It was nice also.

We only had a (what seemed like) a few short hours till cocktail hour at the O-Club and then dinner.  We invited everyone to our house for some pre-cocktail hour drink and socializing.  We all got a little loosened up and went to the cocktail hour.  Haha.  My new vice wing commander here on base used to be the squadron commander of the C-5 unit I'm going to in Dover, DE so he brought me some patches and a scarf from my new unit.  That was sooooo cool of him!  The dinner was nice and it seemed like everyone liked their food.  I had the largest group there so we got free champagne for our table.  That was really fun.  Then I gave Kristen some roses and a flight suit purse.  All in all it was an awesome night!

Well......., I finally made it.  I'm a pilot now in the greatest Air Force in the world.

Next week I'll update everyone on my dates for moving and stuff like that.  It's all a little vague to me right now.

I would really like to thank Kristen for being behind me 100% through this whole ordeal.  There's a lot more but she's a great wife so I'm not worried.  I would also like to thank my parents, grandparents, family and friends for making me the man that I am today.  I'm certainly not perfect but because of the values and great examples that I have in my life I have the tools to become a better man everyday.

Our house is all set up for Halloween.  It will be our last holiday celebration here at Laughlin AFB (tear, tear).  The candy corn decorations in the photos were sent to us just a few days ago by Mama Oddo.  Thanks Mama Oddo.  Haha.  She sent them here because back in the day I would eat all of her candy corn in her house that was meant for decoration....oops.

1 week till I have my wings!

This week I spent a bunch of time filling out a lot of required pre-deployment paperwork.  There is only so much I can do at this point because I have no dates yet.  This Wednesday I should get my dates in so then Kristen and I can find out when we'll be moving and when I'll be deploying.  From previous experience (others who have received similar planes as me) I'll be getting out of Del Rio fairly quickly doing all of my "spin up" training for the deployment.

This week Kristen worked four days!  She got a little sick I think because she was around a bunch of kids.  You would think that we/she would take it easy this weekend but we couldn't....it was a "mandatory fun day" here at Laughlin. Haha.

This weekend our base had an MWS (Major Weapons System) day, which is basically like a career day in the Air Force.  We had over four hours of mandatory briefings on Saturday morning and then we walked outside to see a bunch of different airplanes and talk to the pilots to help us decide what planes we would like to put on our dream sheet.  Funny thing is  that I already filled out my dream sheet a few weeks ago and I got my plane a week ago. But such is life.  Mandatory briefing on a Saturday is a mandatory briefing on a Saturday.  So I went.  Kristen met me outside once the briefings were over with and we walked around all the planes.  Kristen went with me last year to the briefings part, because wives were invited which is very cool, but she elected not to go this year since we already know what planes I'll be flying.  Oh, and both of the planes that I'll be flying were not there.  Oh well.

Later in the day yesterday we went to OG-toberfest.  Which is a spin off of Octoberfest thrown by the Ops Group (OG) commander.  We went last year and we had so much fun with our class so it was nice to be there again with my class again this year.  Especially since we're all done with flying and we're all just waiting for our wings.  So the pressure is off for a while and we can all just relax and have fun.

This week I don't have to much going on in for the first part of the week.  I'll go in tomorrow and close out my gradebook.  They say that you don't graduate pilot training..., your grade book does.  So I gotta make sure that is all straight.  Then I don't have to much else to do until family starts getting in on Tuesday for the graduation on Friday.  I'm so excited that I have so many people coming to the graduation all the way over here in Del Rio.  It makes us feel loved.  Awesome!

Being in the military is awesome so far!  I think that my ROTC commander prepared us well for the challenges of UPT and my upcoming move and deployment.  I know that having this kind of job will and has forced me to miss some things in life.  I don't have a 9-5 Monday through Friday gig.  I have a 24/7 kind of gig.  Most times I'll have weekends and holidays off and sometimes I won't.  I am very appreciative to have a wife that knows my obligation and commitment to my job.  She is very supportive and understanding.  I pray that my family and friends will do the same with upcoming and future events.  This weekend I missed a good friends pre-wedding party, Kristin and Murph back in New Orleans. I want to give them a shout out on the blog here and hope that the party was a great success last night.  We'll see if my deployment dates will "mess up" me attending their wedding in a few days (Wednesday).

New desert look for the website!

Well..., UPT is all but over for Kristen and I.

I had my last flight in the T-1 on Wednesday and then I had my drop on Friday night.

What plane did I get?  Where are we going to be living for the next three to four years? Haha.  Click on this video to see.

I got a MC-12 Liberty deployment to Afghanistan for six months with a C-5 Galaxy follow on to Dover AFB!  So sweet!  It was our first choice!  Haha.  So freekin' awesome!

Here are a few pics of the MC-12 Liberty.

Here are a few pics of the C-5 Galaxy.

My Mom, Bill, Woody and Jen got here on Friday afternoon for the drop.  I had a T-1 sim ready for them when they got here so we went straight to it.  It was fun!  We flew through Las Vegas during the day and night, through the Grand Canyon and around New Orleans!  It was a blast to show off the T-1 to friends.

Friday was such a crazy day!  Kristen was on edge..., I was on edge....., it was just crazy (it's just my career and our lives...., no big deal right?)!  My class decided to have a Halloween themed drop night so some of us dressed up a little for it.  The drop went off without a hitch.  Our class had a GREAT drop!

Not to much to do this week here.  I'll start working on getting my civilian flying license I guess during the week.  We're just waiting for the storm of family to come and visit us for the graduation on the 22 of this month!  It's coming soon!