Jed's An Officer!

Now that Jed's back, I'm going to have to find a different way to keep track of my days and timeline. It's been a week since we've been back together. BEST WEEK EVER!

I left last Friday to fly to Montgomery,Al. I was so excited the night before that I didn't get much sleep so traveled with only 3 hours of sleep. I am definitely not a morning person but waking up at 4:30 a.m. was really easy once I remembered why I was waking up so early. Traveling wasn't so bad either. I got to read (old school style... from an actual book and not my nook haha) and I got to watch the sunrise over the snow covered mountains. I did get stuck to some stinky people though, but after three flights I was finally in Alabama. I really don't think I have ever been so excited to be anywhere. I also got to rent a car. That might seem mundane and not really note worthy, but I got to rent a brand new Dodge Charger. After driving a mini van everywhere I really miss being able to drive a nice fast car. Jed liked the car so much he started looking them up to see how much they were to buy since he needs a car... maybe in 5 years after we pay off our van will he get a nice car until then he's probably going to get a nice beater car. :)

Finally together! 

Anyways, back to my trip... Jed was always telling me how pretty Alabama is and how no one around him thought it was or appreciated it at all so he was really excited to show me the town. It's a bit run down, I'm not going to lie, but the buildings are beautiful! They have an old world French influenced architecture and so much detailing (I'm also a little obsessed with French decor right now). I kept making him stop so I could take pictures of random buildings. There were also lots of civil rights historical sites along with confederate sites. It was a little interesting to see how the site of the Confederacy also inspired so much good for civil rights. We were a little put off by all the confederacy stuff but it was still amazing to see how much history there was in that town.

At the Capitol:

 Oh He's just so HOT!

 I just want this bench

Random buildings:

 the train station was such a beautiful building and even had stained glass windows

 this was one of Jed's favorite buildings

 there were fountains and statues everywhere

This is the officer houses on base! How cute are these houses, it ALMOST makes me want him to put in orders for Montgomery haha

So hopefully, this doesn't offend anyone, but we're not the biggest fan of Southern food. At least not what we ate for the most part. It was fun to try new dishes, but overall it was pretty bland food (I actually salted my food which if you know me is a HUGE deal). Although, I fell in love with this amazing banana pudding dessert. Seriously, I've had bread puddings before but this totally changed my mind about them. It complimented the food so well and it was delicious goodness!

This is the place with the delicious goodness

We did find this one amazing restaurant though. The reviews for it said it wasn't typical Alabama food but still tried to incorporate southern food. It was an Armenian restaurant (part of the reason we wanted to try it was because we both haven't had Armenian before). The food was so good! It was a really cute place too. One of the things I liked is that it had tons and tons of cookbooks everywhere as part of the decor too and they had local artwork. The chef cooked seasonal food and pretty much the menu changed to whatever he wanted to cook for that week. If anyone is ever going to Montgomery, Al you have to go to Michael's Table.

 I was talking to the kids for a nightly phone call

Okay, now to the part you actually want to know about lol... After spending the weekend together Jed had to go back Sunday night and Monday we both had classes to attend. Jed had to do some out processing and I got to attend a spouse orientation. After lunch we were together though. There was an awards ceremony and Jed's flight got an award for best flight. Then Jed was able to give me a tour of the campus. We had a flag ceremony to lower the flag and then we were left to ourselves until the Dining Out.

 Jed's squadron was the Gold Hawks. I forced him to pose here, no one wanted too either

The Dining Out is a formal military dinner. We got to dress up. It's out of my element to dress up so much, but apparently it's something I'm going to have to get used to. It was fun though. They had some funny hosts and even a "grog bowl". There's a list of rules the military have to follow and if you don't follow the rules you can get called out to drink some sort of concoction from a punch bowl in a toilet bowl. There's an unleaded (non alcoholic) and a leaded (alcoholic) drink. The best part about it is that in order to call someone out you have to do it in a rhyme and to respond to the accusation is also done in a rhyme. Luckily, Jed only got called up when his entire flight got called up to do it. It was pretty funny and entertaining.

The next morning was Jed's graduation. It was the moment that we had been waiting for 91 days! It was fun to watch everyone's family try to pin on their stripes too. It seems harder than it should be. After the graduation they had one last parade and they all took the oath one last time together.

 Jed right before he took the oath

Jed taking the Oath

Jed right after with his flight

  Jed's an OFFICER!

It's finally over

We flew back home Wednesday and the kids were so happy to have their daddy back. They are both super clingy right now and just don't want to let him go. Jed's really happy to be back with everyone too.

I wouldn't be a good mom if I didn't take a picture of a plane for Elijah

 I love sunsets in planes

"We're so glad when daddy comes home!"

Two Weeks

I'm sorry if anyone's getting annoyed that my time schedule is only related to when Jed comes home, but if you can't tell we're all really excited and looking forward to it. We have only two more weeks! That's 14 days, and this one is almost over so basically only 13 days :) The best part of it is that I get to see him even sooner. Only 9 more days, that's it! I really don't think that I've been more excited about anything EVER than getting to fly to Alabama to see him. (I'm pretty sure I'm the only person to ever be so excited to fly to Alabama)

Remember this chain we made to count down the days till Jed comes home?

This is our chain today

It's interesting how my attitude's changed since Jed's been gone. I've never been one to really get excited at just the thought of someone. I would probably say I've never been too emotional about anything (sorry I still don't cry at sappy movies).  I know this is a sad thing to admit since we've been married for five years now. I might not be explaining this very well but I've always been super happy and in love with Jed and he always makes me the happiest person ever. I've noticed I'm a lot more emotional now though. Every thought of him makes me smile (or cry depending on how my day went). I've become attached to my phone between 7pm-9pm just waiting for him to call (and most of the time will clear my schedule so I can talk to him). Every disagreement or stupid issue I've ever had with him seems pointless now. At first after he left, if I saw a picture of him I would just cry because I wanted him to be with me (that's a HUGE confession for me). I've really noticed how much I've come to depend on him and not just for the day to day things but for making me a better person too. I'm so giddy with excitement that I get to see him so soon. I even have butterflies! I have even turned into the person that plans my cutest outfits to wear for him down to hair and accessories. It's almost like we're dating, but I don't think I ever did that when we were dating (well we do have a lot of date nights to catch up on). I know Jed doesn't care about anything like that and that he's just happy that we'll finally be together but I still want to impress him. Is that too corny?

Anyways, I wouldn't say this has been the easiest time for anyone, but it really wasn't as horrible as I had imagined it to be. I really don't want to have to do it again, although I might end up being forced to in years to come... but I'm so grateful for everyone's love and support during this time (especially Heavenly Father's) because I don't know what I would do without help. So thank you everyone!

Oh and as an added bonus, another part of Jed coming home is that we get to move into a house! I forgot how much I miss houses and yards. We found out today that they have a brand new house on base that they said will be perfect for us. We can't see it or move in until November 7th, the day before Jed has to report, but we're really looking forward to having space again and all of our things. (The kids miss their toys and books and I miss my kitchen) The house is two stories with 3 beds and 2.5 baths and 2017 sq ft. I can't wait to be able to move in and start decorating it! Here's the floor plans:

And now I'll leave you with some pictures of my love while he's been at OTS. Notice how happy he always is, I'm really grateful that he's still as happy and as optimistic as before.

This is everyone in Jed's flight class.

So there's a funny story about the mustaches. The guys thought it would be funny/fun(?) to grow mustaches for a week and see who had the best stache, so they wrote a memo asking for permission to grow one. Their captain responded that they could, only if everyone in their flight can grow one (notice theres 4 girls in the flight). Apparently this was the next best thing.

My Camera Learning Skills

So I REALLY want this camera:

 It's the Canon 60D with the 18-200 mm lens. It's a step up from the Rebel Ti-3 only in body. They're pretty much the same camera just the 60D is more durable, but they have the same picture quality. The main thing that sold me on this one is with the lens, which I'm dying for, it's cheaper to buy in a package with the 60D then have to buy it individually with the Rebel Ti-3.

My sister in law, Kayla (Kaylaann Photography), has it and let me use it while we were visiting in California. I have super camera envy right now. I really wanted to buy the new camera for Jed's officer graduation. The pictures I got from his college graduation turned out...well, not so good. Jed said I can buy it, but with all of the things (furniture) we're going to have to buy when we move at the end of the month, I couldn't justify spending $1500 on my dream camera. At least not right now. That might sound like too much money to spend on a camera (and it might be) but I love photography and while I'm really only going to use it for personal photos I think it's important to be able to capture the moments, small and big, in my kids' lives and not be upset later that they turned out horrible or grainy (like Chloe's first pics after she was born). 

Jed made a good point, he said I should learn my camera better before buying the new one. So that's what I've been trying to do. Right now I have the Canon G11. It's a point and shoot camera but has manual settings, it's the camera right before a DSLR. I am so happy that I decided to learn my camera, because I figured out so many functions that I didn't even know my camera could do. I'm still having trouble learning my aperture settings (the f stop) but hopefully I will soon. But my picture quality has gotten loads better! I am really happy with the detail of the pictures that I've been able to get using the different functions. I also bought picture editing software, Photoshop Lightroom 3, that my other sister in law, Annie, recommended. I LOVE this program! My pictures have been turning out a lot brighter and turning out how I like them now. Anyways, I thought I would share a few of the pictures that I took trying to learn my camera.

I should mention that I'm only on Chapter 3 of my camera book, so I still have A LOT to learn.

I didn't even know that my camera had a setting to get detail of objects when up close. I would have had a lot less frustrating moments if I had known this earlier.

I also love how vivid the colors are because of the editing software but still able to keep the details.

Look, you can even see the pattern of my jeans! (I know I'm way too excited about that)

the view from our balcony

You might not be able to tell with this picture, but my niece, Avery, was actually swinging back and forth and I was able to capture a still shot. Yea, me!

I thought I should throw in a before editing picture:

    

And after:

 

see? amazing!

So anyways, I'm just nerdily excited about learning my camera right now. I'm also happy that I can take half way decent photos.