We Have Orders!

We have orders...to Jacksonville!!!!!!

Nicholas found out his orders last week but with everything going on, I couldn't bring myself to post it on social media.  I was in a very depressed state and I just couldn't find the happiness in anything at the time (we found out our orders not even 24 hours after Grandpa passed away.)  I didn't want to post a status about the next chapter in our life and have it reflect great sadness (even though the sadness was not over the orders, just what was going on in my life at that time.)  Does that make sense?  Or did I ramble?...because I have a large tendency to do that.  By the time I was in a little bit better state, I was back here in Florida and my mind was on winging.  It felt odd to post about our orders in the midst of the winging hoopla since that is a HUGE deal!  (Those exciting posts coming oh so soon!)

As you might have seen in THIS post, Nick's first choice was the MH-53E stationed out in Norfolk.  Virginia most definitely was not our first location choice but it is the only place the 53 is stationed.  Unfortunately, (as we knew was a strong possibility) there were no 53 spots available :(  {This happens all across the military.  When it's time for a new billet (job), you have to pick from what's available and in this case, 53s just weren't an option.}  Nick was pretty disappointed (this all also came at such a bad time.  He was already struggling with my grandfather's passing and not being able to be home for the wake and funeral as well as be there for me.  Then you throw this news on top of it....it made for a sad Nick.)  Nick's XO talked to him and let him know that this was not at all because Nick wasn't good enough, they just simply had no spots for a 53 pilot.  There was nothing anyone could do.
Thankfully, we got our second choice (our first choice from available options) which is the MH-60R out of Jacksonville, Florida.  We are so ridiculously excited about this!!!!  Jax was definitely our first location choice with the Romeo being Nick's second aircraft choice.
Thankfully Nick has this amazing ability to see the positives in every situation.  No matter how shitty something is, Nick will find the good.  Sometimes it's rather annoying but it is a quality I've always loved about him.  Needless to say, he found a million and one positives in this situation and we honestly cannot wait to PCS and start this new chapter in our life!  We get all giddy just talking about everything!  Nick enjoys flying, no matter what type of aircraft it is, and he's beyond grateful for the opportunity to be flying helos for the Navy.  I'm excited for him to learn all about the Romeo and start training and flying it.

As of now, we plan to head to Jax to do some house hunting (we plan to rent for a few months to learn the area and then buy a house!) and we actually PCS from Pensacola on the 16th of September.  Which is very soon.  Nick will leave for SERE that following Sunday and he checks into his new squadron for the FRS on the 7th of October.
(I will write another post soon about what all this is and means.  And for those wondering what PCS is, it stands for Permanent Change of Station.  Which simply means a "move" from one base/location to another.)

Sorry to those of you that have asked where we're going and didn't received a reply.  The past couple of days have been incredibly busy and I've overlooked some of the comments (sometimes when I get on social media, I just simply log on, type what I need to type (ie. post a photo or status) and log back off, without checking notifications.)  Thank you, everyone, for your support!  We are so excited to be moving to Jacksonville and starting our next adventure!