Dining Out & Football!

There is so much to update that it's overwhelming! I decided to divvy up the posts. This post will be about Dining Out (which took place 2 Fridays ago) and the BYU game! Then I'll have a separate post JUST for our week in St. Louis!

Friday, Nov. 20th was BYU's Air Force ROTC Dining Out. It's a once a semester formal dinner and program - which happens toward the end of the semester. It's catered and everyone is all dressed up. At the beginning there is a POW/MIA presentation which always makes my eyes water. They set out a table and a seat for the POW/MIA's and their place setting has certain things on it. I found this online which is a script of the recorded narration that they play as one cadet at a time slowly walks up to the table to place these things on it, then renders a slow salute. Before they set the table they have one cadet bring the POW/MIA flag in, post it and then present it. Clay was the one who posted the flag, and his slow salute was AWESOME! I wish I had recorded it but it would give you chills.

"THIS TABLE SET FOR ONE IS SMALL -- SYMBOLIZING THE FRAILTY OF ONE PRISONER ALONE AGAINST HIS OPPRESSORS."

"THE TABLECLOTH IS WHITE -- SYMBOLIZING THE PURITY OF THEIR INTENTIONS TO RESPOND TO THEIR COUNTRY'S CALL TO ARMS. REMEMBER."

"THE SINGLE YELLOW ROSE -- SYMBOLIZING REMEMBRANCE -- DISPLAYED IN A VASE, REMINDS US OF THE FAMILIES AND LOVED ONES OF OUR COMRADES-IN-ARMS WHO KEEP FAITH AWAITING HIS RETURN, LEST WE FORGET. REMEMBER."

"THE RED RIBBON TIED SO PROMINENTLY ON THE VASE IS REMINISCENT OF THE RED RIBBON WORN UPON THE LAPEL AND BREASTS OF THOUSANDS WHO BEAR WITNESS TO THEIR UNYIELDING DETERMINATION TO DEMAND PROPER ACCOUNTING OF OUR MISSING. REMEMBER."

"A SLICE OF LEMON IS ON THE BREAD PLATE TO REMIND US OF THEIR BITTER FATE. REMEMBER."

"THERE IS SALT UPON THE BREAD PLATE -- SYMBOLIC OF THE FAMILIES TEARS AS THEY WAIT. REMEMBER."

"THE GLASS IS INVERTED, THEY CANNOT TOAST WITH US THIS NIGHT. REMEMBER."

"THE CHAIR -- THE CHAIR IS EMPTY -- THEY ARE NOT HERE. REMEMBER."

"REMEMBER, ALL OF YOU WHO SERVED WITH THEM AND CALLED THEM COMRADES. WHO DEPENDED UPON THEIR MIGHT AND AID AND RELIED UPON THEM, FOR SURELY, THEY HAVE NOT FORSAKEN YOU. (Quietly) REMEMBER."

Every time they do the ceremony my eyes get watery. Clay was in charge of commanding the cadets as they marched in and out and he said he could hardly do it afterward because he got a little choked up.

With that aside, it was a fun night with friends! They have this thing called the Grog which is just a nasty mix of different drinks poured into a toilet that sits on a table. When they "open the grog" it allows for any cadet to come up (march in military fashion) and call out another cadet for doing something wrong during dinner (there are a lot of rules concerning manners, how to toast, etc). Then that accused cadet comes up and tries to counter their claim but they usually end up drinking from the grog anyway. There's a whole procedure on how to drink from the grog also - you have to salute it, fill the cup, do an about face, raise the cup and say "To the Mess!" (I think that's what it is, I'd have to check again). Then they have to gulp down the cup and hold it upside down over their head to make sure every drop was gone. Then they throw it away, return to their seat and before they could sit down they had to yell (Are you NOT entertained?). They change the saying each Dining Out. Anyway, the reason I'm even mentioning is because Clay had to drink from the grog TWICE. I knew it was coming. He hadn't done anything wrong BUT he had the audacity to call out another cadet and called him by the wrong rank, then corrected himself. Poor guy. So he had to drink. Then his entire flight got called up to the grog for, basically, being the best FTP flight but everyone thinks they're all a little too cocky so they made them drink. Clay said the grog was actually pretty good and he didn't mind!

Boys...

We all had a lot of fun!

The women

We sat with Cadet Keller and his wife Minta, and another cadet and his date.

Now on to some exciting stuff! We flew back from St. Louis on Friday, got home around 11:00 and went right to bed. In the morning we unpacked everything, did laundry, went to Wal-Mart and made it all in time for the BYU Vs. Utah game!!! We were glad we didn't sell our tickets. We considered it but man would we have regretted that! 3 apache helicopters flew over the stadium before the game started and they had the letters BYU on their bellies. "Y" flew over us so that's the only one I caught a picture of.

The game was a lot of fun - although it wouldn't have been if we'd lost! It got REALLY cold during the 2nd half but we all managed to stay warm. Maeli fell asleep toward the end of the 2nd quarter then slept through half time and some of the 3rd quarter. We laid her on the ground by our bleachers ( we had the best seats ever! RIGHT in front of a portal so we had an entire row of NOBODY behind us so we could put our bags, etc there, stand back there with nobody to block the view AND we were on the end of the row and the 3 seats to the side of us were EMPTY!). After Maeli woke up she just laid there content for the rest of the quarter just giving us the biggest smiles.

We were screaming and jumping up and down, it was CRAZY! Pandemonium 2009! (Mad TV reference there). Here is a picture progression of the final moments of the game.

Winning touchdown

People jumping over rails to get onto the field...

Congregating around the team...

...and PACKED full!

We didn't run onto the field because Maeli weighs 25 stinking pounds, plus we had tons of baggage, Clay had to do stadium clean-up and he has a messed up foot (which I will talk about in my next post). While I was sitting with some other Air Force wives while the guys cleaned, I was right next to Max Hall for his news interviews and he came out again to get pictures of him and his family with the field behind him. TOO bad my camera batteries died RIGHT after the game ended. I wanted to get a picture of him holding Maeli because she had his jersey on!

We had a lot of fun and were so glad we bought the all sports passes so we could watch all of the games. Hopefully next season will be even better!

Las Vegas and the Air Show!

Alright so I slacked a little with the blog but not really compared to a lot of people that only update once a month or less (you know who you are!). Veteran's Day was on Wednesday and the 4-man drill team had a performance at the Covey Arts center in Provo. The place was packed, even some high school classes were there to watch. The drill team did great (Don't worry I won't post the video because I took it with one of the guy's cameras instead of mine). We stayed for the entire program. It was so touching. I feel like this is one of the perks of Clay joining the Air Force. We get invited to go to these types of programs and be in the midst of all of these heroes that people wouldn't recognize as such if they just passed them on the street. But here, these guys are in their element. They love saluting the flag and standing up when the song representing their military branch is played. They handed out a few awards which made me cry. During the first one I had tears streaming from my eyes consistently. I felt like a big baby. This is why:http://www.heraldextra.com/special-section/article_6e662b73-04bc-575f-a97c-3dd310b4d2d8.html . Pearl Rex had her family on stage behind her while she received an award and the host told the story of how her son was MIA for 30 years. Her son was married, had a 1 1/2 year old daughter and another on the way (enter waterworks for me!). The 1 1/2 year old daughter was actually present at this program and they mentioned that she only had one memory of her father and that was horse back riding with him the day before he left on his final mission. Oh man. So sad.

Anyway, onto happier news : Applebee's had a veteran's special so we all went there for lunch (and possibly dinner...) because military ate for free! Yay! We also found out that last night Golden Corral was letting military eat for free but we found out after we had already eaten. Oh well.

Friday afternoon we left Provo with two other couples and drove to Las Vegas. We visited the strip for a small amount of time - just went to the Bellagio and Caesar's Palace and then left to go eat for a lot cheaper. After dinner we went to my aunt and uncle's house and visited with them and slept! We were up bright and early at 7 so that we could be ready and out the door by 7:30. We went to IHOP for breakfast then drove to Nellis Air Force Base for the big air show. We found out that we were allowed to park on base since we had military ID's which was WAY nice because everyone else had to park at the speedway and shuttle over which took over an hour each way because of the long wait. So we got there around 9:30 and stayed until 4ish. We visited the BX (Base Exchange) and had a lot of fun! Maeli did great for waking up 3 hours earlier than normal and only getting a 30 minute nap all day because of the noise. However, she did sleep all 6 hours on the drive back to Provo.

I figure I'll just post pictures and some video and talk about the air show - too much happened to cover it all!

The pictures are out of order but oh well. Here are some pictures of the thunderbirds. They were AMAZING! You can see the "birds" painted onto their jets in this picture. It was amazing how they were always in the perfect spot and could keep their formation for so long while FLYING. Pilots are amazing.

All I could think about while watching all of the different jets and planes flying is "Holy cow! There is someone in that thing! If I were them I would be throwing up right now!" Seriously. I have a lot of respect for those guys. And of course, it just made Clay want to be a pilot even more.

If you've never seen the ground show, it's pretty cool. They do everything in perfect sequence all at the same time. This stuff really impresses me after seeing the drill team practice and perform so many times. Anything done at the exact same time is very cool and takes a lot of practice.

This is the A-10 warthog, Clay's *hopefully* future child.

The Thunderbird maintenance crew before they do the ground show

Clay standing in front of the A-10 Warthog

Pretty ugly. It shoots bullets the size of coke bottles!

the water show at the Bellagio

Out of order but Maeli wasn't very happy at the beginning of the air show because she needed a nap!

Ok this was hilarious. It's hard to tell what's going on but we were watching the Thunderbirds (there are 6 of them) and here 4 of them were doing some formation that everyone was oohing over and while that was happening, one of the other jets flew RIGHT over the crowd with their burners on and it was ear piercing loud! So loud that kids were screaming and crying for a minute afterward. So funny.

This is a video of the A-10 in action

Lastly - I made this slideshow for Clay on our 5th anniversary of our very 1st date (it was last Friday). I heard this song on Kevin and Nicole's blog and the words just automatically made me think of Clay and how crazy the past two years have been for us. He started out thinking he would do construction for the rest of his life and not even worry about college...and 2 years later here we are after having been through a lot of struggles and he's at BYU and becoming an officer in the Air Force. Never would have guessed that's where we'd be but God has a funny way of helping you figure out where you NEED to be :) P.S. Can you believe how bald, cute and little Maeli used to be?

http://www.youtube.com/watch_private?v=bH8K0e-Sbso&sharing_token=UrxgSMrMjEsJzckW4QiWew==

Our humble abode....and other stuff.

Clay's scholarship money came in over a week ago and we had already set aside money to buy some small furniture for our place and really make it home-y. We went to Ikea (I had never been there, talk about confusing!) because we heard they were cheap. No kidding! We got end tables for 8 bucks. Anyway....so we re-decorated our place. It's not totally done but eh. I am satisfied with it completely as is so we probably won't add to it unless we find something we like. We have to finish Maeli's room still (it's only half painted) but I imagine that won't be for awhile because I have no motivation to start painting again.

So the past week was busy because any night we didn't have anything planned, we drove around looking for good deals. We still made time to hang out with friends though! And the 4-man drill team had two performances this weekend. On Saturday morning we met up with the guys at the Smith Field House around 10. Then we drove to the Scera Theater in Orem for a Veteran Program. It was so cute to see all of the old men and their wives there with walkers and such, wearing their old military hats with pride. There was a man in front of me who was probably my height and so little, but he had served in the marines and it was cute to see him stand up when the USMC flag was brought out. The drill team was one of the first to perform. They did a good job but two dropped their guns. One of them was because of the bright lights directly above them and he couldn't see his gun when he threw it. The other was a fluke. People were still impressed and I always think they do well, just a little shaky in parts. I think it would be nerve racking. All eyes on you, completely silent and if you mess up just a little bit it throws off the entire cadence of the routine. But they seem to be able to keep their nerves together for the most part. Clay is always completely calm....speaking of!

Sunday we went to a holiday party for a special forces group that just got home recently. There's a national guard in Lehi. So we went there (we had friends watch Maeli all day and take her to church) and met up with the BYU Color guard and their wives also. The space where the drill team performed though was probably 4 times smaller than what they were used to so they struggled a bit with their tosses and didn't want to hit anybody in the crowd. At one point Clay's gun hit the hand of another guy and it cut up the guy's hand so well that red blood started soaking through his white glove (I didn't notice but they told me afterward)! It wasn't Clay's fault, he was doing the right move at the right time but the other guy's position was off. At one point Clay caught a gun with his left hand, all while holding his own gun in his right (they were supposed to toss to each other) but he just handed his gun to the guy across from him and kept a completely frozen calm face on. I was impressed! Given the circumstances I think they did great. No guns dropped this time, just some collision. They have another performance on Wednesday for Veteran's Day at the Covey Center for a crowd of Gold Star mothers (Moms who have lost a son or daughter in war) and I have a feeling I'm going to bawl my eyes out. They also were told they're going to perform in Brigham Square on campus for the commander of the Northwest region who is coming to our Dining Out next weekend. I feel like I am the wife of the drill team. This 4 man team plus the captain, Clay is the only one that is married. None of the guys have girlfriends so I just hold all of their things for them, take pictures and videos with their cameras, etc.

We are heading to Las Vegas this upcoming weekend for the big air show. Clay's flight decided to take the trip so we're driving down with another couple on Friday night and we get to stay with Jackie and Gary! Clay is super excited to go on base. He has been doing a lot of research, talking to a LOT of people and I really think he is going to change his #1 job choice to pilot. I support him, and have gotten used to the idea now. There was a 2 star general that gave a fireside last night who was a fighter pilot. The pros just really seem to outweigh the cons of being a pilot and really moving Clay's career forward. I'm feeling better about the danger aspect of it because he wouldn't be in danger like the movie Top Gun. He'd be doing things from afar and the colonel (also a fighter pilot) said that Clay would only fly for a short time as a fighter pilot. Most of his career he would be in leadership roles on bases and things. This is what he wants to fly:

It's an A-10 warthog. He loves how big and ugly it is. In fact, he saw a t-shirt at the Provo airport for it that had a picture of it and said "Ugly enough to be your mother."

We'll see!

Here are pictures from our decorating - Before and Afters...

BEFORE (we hated that shelf in the middle of the window!)

AFTER

We love these gray curtains

BEFORE

AFTER kinda...gotta finish painting

Before...

AFTER

Still need to build our headboard

BEFORE

AFTER (we're going to enlarge the right photo - I bought the frames at DI for 5 bucks total and spray painted them)

Our living room curtains

I loooooove lamps! Seriously. The lighting from a lamp is so calming to me

BEFORE

AFTER

And their Veteran program performance:

part 1 - Clay is 2nd in line...and after they disburse from the line he is on the left!

part 2

4-Man first real performance

Yesterday at LLAB (it's a 2-hour period where all of the ROTC cadets get together for lectures, guest speakers, practice marching, combat days, etc.) the topic was Drill and Ceremonies. The cadets in charge thought it would be a good idea to have the 4-man team perform for everyone because drill team is the epitome of well...drill. The uniform of the day were their BDU's but when they perform this at SCIDM and other places around Utah they are in full service dress (the blue suit) and have special hats to wear and white gloves. They have a performance tomorrow at the SCERA theater in Orem that is open to the public and will be their first time performing for a big group of civilians. Their performance is divided into two because our stupid camera will only let me record a 3-minute long video and then automatically stop. So if you want to buy me an awesome video camera or something of that relation, that would be great! There was only one gun drop in the performance. Clay was trying to catch it and it dropped but I am sure he would like me to point out that it wasn't his fault, but Cadet Gross' throw and was sure to point out to me that Cadet Gross kept apologizing afterward. After the performance cadet Captain Williams (the drill team captain who everyone is scared of) came up to me and we talked for about 10 minutes about Clay and his future. Clay is considering putting pilot as his first job choice because of the possibilities it would give him compared to any other career choice. If he wants to be general, his odds go way up if he is a pilot. Plus he gets extra pay, other benefits, shorter deployments, and gets a lot of special treatment if he goes that route. We haven't made any final decisions but Capt. Williams was trying to help persuade me to let Clay be a pilot, and I'm not totally opposed to it anymore. We'll see! Clay talked to the Colonel for an hour this morning allllll about his career options, how to become a general and what he needs to do. We'll keep you updated. He has a year to figure it out :)

Anyway - here are the videos. I put them up on Youtube this time so that the other cadets could watch and critique themselves. Hopefully you don't get too sick of seeing this same performance in another day or two. I plan on putting it up here so you can see what it looks like in their other uniform with the hats and all.

2 years ago today...

Today is our 2 year anniversary. It actually took us both by surprise. I was looking at a calendar on Sunday and saw November 3rd and thought "Why does that date sound so familiar?" I figured it out and reminded Clay. On our one year anniversary we were in the hospital and had been for two days already. It was a bummer and we never celebrated it. We're not really sure how we're going to celebrate this year...what do people do on anniversaries?? We're going to have a nice dinner tonight - debating between going out or having a nice candlelit one here. And eventually we're going to go up to Park City for a night but things are so busy that we don't know when we'll get around to that. Oh well.

When our wedding pictures were being taken there are only a handful where Clay was actually looking at the camera. He couldn't keep his eyes off of me!
Sometimes it's hard to think that it's already been two years, but also feels like we've been married much longer than that. Next Friday (the 13th, scary!) will be the anniversary of our very first date - 5 YEARS AGO! I guess I feel like we've been married that long. The other Sunday in church a teacher asked who got married after knowing each other for only 6 months and then asked who had known each other a year before they got married. Clay and I were one of the few couples who couldn't raise their hands. We had been dating for 3 years (technically he was in Taiwan on his mission but, I still count it)! I love being married to my best friend - he always makes me laugh and is the best dad and husband. I know he would do absolutely anything for me if I asked him to. Here's to an eternity together!

Side Note: I randomly came across an old picture of my niece Tia when she was younger (not sure exactly how old but somewhere around how old Maeli is now). It threw me for a loop when I had first glanced at it. Don't these girls just look related?

Tia

Maeli ( they look even more similar than these pictures show but I couldn't find one of Maeli close-up smiling really big with her hair in those cute little pigtails on top of her head)

Halloween is, like, totally radical!

On Friday Clay finished his side job at the Provo airport and then we went to Home Depot to return unused caulk, and other random odds and ends that Clay has been storing in the Jeep for the last YEAR! They gave us 40 bucks back so we decided to use that money and buy wood and cinder blocks to finally build a box spring for our king sized bed. All we bought was the mattress so it had been lying on the floor ever since we moved in and I wanted to have a real bed finally. So Clay went to work and built a really sturdy box spring for it - it took him 10 minutes - it was pretty amazing to watch him work. And instead of buying a frame, we decided to just place the box spring on cinder blocks strategically placed to support the whole box spring. BUT first I spray painted them dark brown so they would look like fancy wood and match our bedding. I LOVE spray paint. It is so easy and immediately transforms everything. I told Clay I am going to have to buy spray paint more often and just spray paint things to instantly make them look new. So here is our bed... (With Clay's makeshift "night stand/lamp stand"...we're going to buy a nightstand sometime)

I looooooove having a real bed that is off the ground. It's amazing the difference it makes in the room. It makes the room look so much cleaner and bigger. On Friday morning Maeli and I went to DI to look for some 80's garb for our Halloween party we were going to but instead I bought NICE stuff. I got Maeli her first pair of real shoes, they were in great condition. And I bought myself the most awesome denim skirt - it's even Ralph Lauren and cost 4 dollars. I love DI now. They really do have some awesome stuff and so what if someone owned it before, as long as it is in great condition and you wash the "DI Stink" out of it, it's yours. I told Clay this must be a confirmation that we have reached "poor student" status - when you love DI for REAL clothes and not just costume clothes. Here are her shoes -
Friday night we FINALLY got around to carving our 25 lb. pumpkin. Nothing like last minute, right? Well we decided to try a different route and instead of carving it (the pumpkin was super thick and it would've been a hassle to carve) we decided to peel it, using Clay's carpentry chisel. I designed the old tree freehanded and then Clay carved a big hole in the back so that it would cast a shadow on the wall to look like a full moon. Then I drew a witch flying on a broom, colored her black with a marker and taped her on the wall.

Our autumn evening...if you click on the pic to enlarge it you can see Maeli has something dark on her mouth - she's chewing on a leaf.

It was too hard to get a good picture of the pumpkin lit up but you can see the moon/witch in the background. It really did light up well but the camera couldn't capture it.

So cute...

We decided to walk to a park on Saturday afternoon because they just made it. It is 3 blocks from us so it takes about 5 minutes to walk to. Here is Maeli saying "please, please, no pictures"

I told Clay "She looks like a real human with shoes on!"

I swear she's turning into a puppy

Saturday night we had been invited to go to a friend's halloween party with an 80's theme. It was a lot of fun and we got to see some old friends from our old ward again. We played 80's Scene It - which was way fun, I bet Kev and Nicole would especially love it. We were worried it'd be really hard and most of the people there were only alive for half of the 80's but I knew most of the answers (except for the movies), and I credit that to having older siblings that lived through the 80's and actually remembered it. We also played Mafia which was a LOT of fun. I was a detective for half of the games we played it seemed like and my partner would always be the first one dead so I was on my own but still managed to kill off the mafia most of the time. Fun game, good times.

My 80's outfit

Maeli was SUPER grouchy about 30 minutes before the party because she hadn't had a nap but...here is her 80's outfit. I got that jacket from mom so it was authentic 80's!

Here is a video from Friday night while carving pumpkins. I put on some music to see if I could finally capture Maeli dancing on camera. Sorry it's a little long but it's cute!

Nerds everywhere!

Just wanted to post some pictures from our Air Force Halloween party last night. We all went as nerds. Although we didn't get a close-up, Maeli's pacifier says " I heart NERDS" and Clay's pocket protector says "I am not a geek, I'm a level 9 warlord." We had fun, especially making an appearance at Sportsman's Warehouse right before the party in our nerd apparel to buy some gloves for another cadet. I thought it was especially funny that Clay looked so dorky and yet, when at the register he asked the cashier "Do you give military discounts?" She probably thought less of our military until I blurted out "We're going to a halloween party!" With that said, Maeli won the child costume contest so we got a gift card to Wal-Mart - although the colonel (one of the two judges) told us that she is too cute to ever be a nerd, no matter how we dress her up. Aw shucks.

And before the pictures, just some other info - Clay's stipend officially started pouring into our bank account. Yay! He also scored 100 on his physical fitness test yesterday for the first time. He had always gotten extremely close- 98.5 or more but they get really picky about what push-ups and sit-ups count and don't count. Now he gets a t-shirt and gets to be in the "Warrior Club" AND at the end of the semester (or year I'm not sure) he gets to add a ribbon to his uniform. AND lastly - he got his military ID on Wednesday so now he gets discounts and we can go up to Hill AFB whenever and buy stuff. Woo hoo! Maeli and I can get it as well but we'll have to go back later and bring all of the documentation we need.

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!! We have another party on Saturday night that is 80's themed so it should be fun. Clay thought it'd be funny to dress in civil war attire and when we show up say "OH you meant 1980's!" but...we don't have clothes to do that. Oh well. :)

She is too funny. She claps ALL the time now. She can pull herself up to stand, and often times does this in front of the long mirror in the hallway so that she can talk and laugh at herself. And if she finds another pacifier on the floor she ditches the one she already has...as seen here. Oh, and she LOVES to dance. It's hilarious. Any time music starts she starts bouncing and clapping.

My nerdy family...Maeli did so well. She kept that headband and the glasses on all night! I couldn't even do that...

Clay didn't know what to do with his free hand. I think this picture is hilarious.

Pie eating contest. Unfortunately the man next to Clay won, and boy did he! He dumped his pie out onto the table (you had to eat all of the crust etc) and he ate all of that, then Clay took his pie in his mouth and dumped half of his pie in that guy's mess, and he ate that too and still beat everyone!

The aftermath

The Grinch...and a jellyfish

Me and my baby