Life Update: Packing and Moving

Life has been CRAZY!!!!  So crazy that I have yet to blog anything about Nick's Winging week festivities!  It was truly one of the most exciting times in our lives together and I have never been more proud.  But those posts will have to wait.  I promise to blog about them after we leave Pensacola and life slows down just a little.

This moving thing has taken up all of our time.
Nick winged, family left, we packed for 5 days (and by we, I mean me since Nick was still working 12 hour days), headed to Jax to house hunt for a week, came back and have been packing the past 3 days.  Only two more days left to pack, one day to load the truck, one day to clean, then we leave to start our new chapter!

Here is just a a quick update for you all:

• We are beyond excited for this move.  At first, Nick was pretty bummed to not be flying the MH-53 but it didn't last long (as we all knew would be the case because Nick is truly incapable of being in a bad mood or being a glass half empty kind of guy).  Virginia was most absolutely NOT our first location choice (or second...or third...or fourth) so we're happy to be in Jax, our first location choice.  I know some think we're insane for wanting Jax and being excited about it, but I cannot express how excited we are.  All of Nick's sadness has left and he's stoked about this next adventure.  Every time we talk about our new home and life, we find more and more reasons to be excited.
  We're happy to be in city larger than Pensacola with a lot more going on.  We're happy to be in a location that still does not get winters (well, not cold winters).  We're happy to still be a day's drive from St. Louis.  I'm happy to start volunteering at the Mayo Clinic.  I'm happy to still be near beaches.  And we are beyond thrilled to be near so many friends!!!  Nick's best friend from enlistment, stationed at Kings Bay, lives in Jax, not far from our (hopeful) new home.  Our best friends from Pensacola are there (in the same neighborhood!).  My other Navy bestie is there and has offered us so much advice (as well as letting us crash with her the past week while house hunting).  Not to mention we are so close to Charleston and we have LOTS of really good friends there and plans to go visit them all are already in the works.  We also plan to take mini-vacays to Savannah and of course next spring we'll head to Jupiter for Cardinals spring training!!!

• I'm still having a very difficult time with Grandpa's passing.  Luckily I've been kept very busy and this has helped keep my tears at bay.  But when I do finally get some down time, I can't help but cry over how badly I miss him.
• I'm really annoyed that I've yet to update my resume from my previous job.  (I'm so bummed we're leaving so soon because I truly loved my job, the kids, and my co-workers and I was looking forward to working with them all again for a little bit longer.)  But moving, house hunting, and all that comes with that has taken up every free second so the resume and job searching will have to wait until we're there.
• We're eating the oddest combinations of meals as we're trying to clear out as much from our fridge and freezer as possible.  We've eaten an insane amount of fries lately.  I'm sure we won't succeed and I'll be calling friends to see if they'd like to take any of it before we toss it in the trash.  As for the pantry, that's a lost cause trying to consume it all.  We (Nick) keep far too many things in there!  He has so many bags of chips, boxes of Rice-a-Roni, cans of Steak n Shake chili, tons of cereal, Pop-Tarts, etc.  The kid loves his (pre-packaged, pre-bagged, processed) food.  We will have many, many boxes of food.  And I'd say maybe one box is my stuff (and it's primarily baking ingredients).
• I'm doing my part to minimize the bottles we need to bubble wrap and box by drinking wine each night (and during the day...no shame).  I'm just looking out for what's best for us...saving money on packing supplies and saving space on the truck ;)  Nick has no complaints as the wine helps my anxiety and therefore he's not as tempted to use the packing tape on my anxious, whiny, bitchy mouth.  I will not deny I'm an unpleasant packer.  I'm constantly complaining "I hate this" (or "I hate you" since Nick is the one strongly against letting the military move us and he hoards and owns more than half the shit we're packing) or I'm worrying "We're never going to get this done!" and "All of this is not going to fit on the truck!"  And then the bitching "Get off your phone and pack!  What are you doing?  You're wasting time!"  Surprisingly, Nick stays calm and keeps his eye rolling at a minimum (which is really in his best interest.  Sometimes he even makes us a drink (the best move for both of us.)
• Sadly, this move has not prompted Nick to purge any of this stuff as I had hoped.  Nick is a certified hoarder.  He has so much shit he doesn't need (ie.  pogs...a massive amount of pogs and slammers.  And, a UNICYCLE!  Really?!  C'mon!  We aren't circus performers).  But would he part with any of it?  NOPE!  Now, there are times during this packing process where he's said "Let's sell this."  Yeah, good call jackass.  Let me go ahead and list it on Craigslist considering we have two days left here.  Or he'll say "Let's go through this box of papers." (Yes, he has boxes upon boxes of nothing but papers.)  Um, we don't have time for that!!!!  And the same with clothes.  He has an insane amount of clothes he could easily donate if he had the time to go through them (not kidding you, four 44 gallon tubs of Banana Republic slacks, hundreds of Express button down shirts, etc.  It's sickening.)  But because we have limited time, all this shit has to go with us.  The good news is Nick is crazy motivated to have a nice and organized garage in our new home which means he's willing to finally go through and purge this stuff.  Unfortunately, it can't happen before the move.  Why couldn't he have decided this in the past two years we were here?!  

• Our dogs are so confused as to what is going on.  Dogs thrive off a routine and normalcy, and life has been anything but.  I was gone for 2.5 weeks.  They drove 12 hours to STL and stayed for a long weekend.  They drove 12 hours back to Florida and I was gone from them for another week.  I returned but that same day so did a lot of family and friends (for Nick's winging).  They left and the house began being tore down.  Friends and their dogs came for a weekend.  They left, and we followed, to Jacksonville where they stayed in a new home, with new dogs.  We returned and the house became even more of a disaster as everything they know is being packed up.
  Sadly, this chaos won't be stopping anytime soon.  We pack them up and move them to Jax where they'll live in another new house (a friend's house) for a week.  Then we go stay with my sister for two weeks.  Then we return to Jax to stay in that new house again for another 2-ish weeks.  Then we finally (hopefully) move into their new home and their belongings, the things they're familiar with, return.  I cannot wait for this.  The girls anxiety is driving me nuts.  The constant (more than usual) need for attention and their utter confusion makes packing so much more difficult!  I just wish I could explain to them what is going on!!!

So that's our life update.  Nothing exciting and almost all of it revolves around this packing and moving ordeal.  Hopefully next week I can work on Nick's winging post (once I get all the photos together)

Breezeway Home Anniversary

Two years ago, at 5:30am, Nicholas, Yadi, and I pulled up to our new home here in Milton, Florida on Breezeway Circle.

This might sound crazy, but we quickly came to love our new home of Milton.  I know a lot of people hate it here, but honestly, it is what you make it.  If you keep telling yourself you hate it and it's awful here, then it will continue to be awful.  That's not how Nick and I live life and that helped us to come to love our last two years here.  Life is an adventure and it's all what you make it!

One of the reasons we have loved our time here is because of this house.  We truly spoiled ourselves here.  There were so many things we loved about our home, that we added to our "must have" list for our new home in Jacksonville. (Which made house hunting in Jax so much harder.)
This house has no carpet, all hardwood and tile.  It has three bedrooms and two bathrooms.  A separate office space.  A ginormous walk-in pantry.  An open floor plan with a huge living room.  A two car garage.  A huge, privacy fenced backyard.  A fantastic neighborhood with a really convenient location.
We learned that finding all of these things in a new home was difficult.  We are truly going to miss this home.

Just as we reached this two year mark, we're packing up our belongings and getting ready to say goodbye to our first real home.  I'd be lying if I said I haven't teared up as I've pulled photos off the wall and taken down curtains.  We have thoroughly loved this place.  If these walls could talk, they'd have stories full of love and laughter.  Our marriage started here and flourished!  We added our second "child", Vino, to our family in this house.  We learned what a marriage is all about, growing together as husband and wife, but also continuing to grow individually.  We grew stronger in friendship and love inside these walls.  I can still vividly remember the giddy, newlywed bliss as Nick carried me over the threshold, saying "Welcome home, wife" when we arrived that early morning on September 11, 2011.  I wondered how long that "honeymoon phase" would last.  I'm happy to say that after over two years of marriage, we're still in the phase.  And I don't see it fading anytime soon.
Of course these walls didn't always see perfection.  We faced some difficult times with illnesses, military stress, homesickness, and general uncertainty of life, but together we overcame them.
This house will always hold some of my fondest memories and I know I'll cry when we say our final goodbye and drive away from Breezeway Circle.  But I'm happy to have so many memories  and so many pictures, of the last two years here.
We moved into what was just an empty house, but it very quickly became a home.  These have honestly been two of the best years of my life.

We met the new family moving into our home; a husband, wife, and very young girl.  I can only hope these walls provide as much joy to them as it has to us.  I hope they too leave this house with deeper love and understanding of each other and themselves, just as we have.

I'm going to miss you Breezeway Home.  Thank you for all the amazing memories.  May you continue to bless each new tenant with the same wonderful experience we had.

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!

Nick Update: Almost Finished!

In exactly one month, I will be pinning wings of gold on the sexiest aviator ever!
Time is starting to go by so quickly!  Nick could very well be finished flying by this time next week!!!!!

My last update was back in early April so a lot has happened since then.

Me in front of Nick's helo, the TH-57

Nick started out flying the TH-57B (Bravo). It allowed to them learn the basics of flying and hovering.  They learned to autorotate, a term which sounded fun until Nick explained it's learning to "crash land".  Essentially, when the engine is cut, the blades autorotate and provide a little lift and lighter "fall" while they try to regain power or control.  (These are the things your wife doesn't want to hear.  While I'm happy he's learned to do this and it could save his life and his crew's life, I'd just rather not know.  A simple "training went well today.  I've landed safely" text will suffice.)

The TH-57B has one set of instruments (or gauges), no stability and although it can fly at night, they only flew during the day and it had to be flown in good weather. They start out in this learning the basics of flying a helo and hovering in about 18 flights. 

They start with the “contact” flights which is just familiarization and learning to fly a helo, then a checkride to determine if they’re safe for solo and then a solo. 

After their contacts solo, they do “super-FAM” (familiarization) flights to fine tune the previous skills.  Following these is “tactics” flights.  These are exposure to confined area landings (for example, landing in a gap of a trees), pinnacle landings (landing on a raised surface, like a plateau or building), external load operations (pick up weights and drop them, lift, transport).  Since it’s an “exposure” to them, they only do one flight for each of these 
Below are videos of him doing the external load operations:

Once they've "mastered" flying, they move up to the TH-57 Charlie model. This is a different model of the helicopter (but to me looks exactly the same):  It has two sets of instruments, stability control, and is capable of flying at night and under poor weather conditions (such as conditions where you don’t have to see outside.)  Again, they start out with familiarization flight learning the new helo.  It begins with basic instruments, which is learning to use JUST the instruments in the helo, without visual.  For these, Nick flew with a hood attached to his helmet that blocked his vision outside of the helicopter.  (An instructor sits in the seat to the left of him and is his eyes for the left side of the aircraft, with another student sitting behind Nick, acting as his eyes on the right side. Just in case.)  These skills will greatly come in handy when he’s flying over the water at night when it’s pitch black with nothing visua to reference. 

After these flights, Nick moved onto RI flights (radio instruments).  This is where he started flying to other airports in the area such as Mobile, Tallahassee, or his “cross country” flight to Memphis.  During this phase of flights, he uses the instruments that are receiving signals from navigations devices on the ground to fly.  Essentially, this stage allows them to learn to fly and operate under instrument flight rules (IFR) which allows them to navigate without seeing where you’re going using things like GPS, signals, etc.  This is THE most important and biggest stage of all of flight school because once he completed this, he was essentially “instrument rated” meaning that if he were a civilian (or Navy pilot) he could fly under instrument/IFR conditions without having to have someone else who was qualified for that. 

During this time, Nick was pretty non-existent around our home.  He was putting in about 10-12 hour days on base, coming home, showering, and going straight to the office to study.  He spent the rest of the night in there until about midnight (sometimes later.)  It was rough on him and he was downright exhausted all of the time.  (Good thing he loves what he does!)

After this, he did a “cross country” flight to Mobile where he took the helo off by himself (with an observer, but no instructor because there must be two people at the control at all times), landed somewhere else, shut down the helo, went and grabbed lunch, then came back. 

After this it was on to “low levels”.  Despite the biggest hurdle being accomplished (the instrument rated part I just mentioned) and the rumors that flight school was all downhill after that, there was still a lot of work to do for the remaining flights.  Low levels (there were 5 of these flights) required a great deal of planning, preparing charts and planning routes at low altitudes, beginning at 500 ft and later flights at about 200 ft above ground.

Next was “formations” (4 flights), which is exactly what it sounds like.  Helicopters (two of them) flying in formation together.  The last was a low level formation flight at 200 feet.  He has just finished this block of training and now he's moving on to Search and Rescue flights.  This is just one flight and it gives him exposure to search and rescue, which includes running search patterns.

Following those will be his last block of training, NVGs (night vision goggles).  It sounds pretty basic (and fun) but apparently it's more complicated and exhausted than one would expect.  

After that, he's flight school complete!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  

I hope all of that made sense.  Nick tries to explains things to me in terms I understand and therefore I tried to do the same for our friends and family.  I probably know a little more than the average person since my husband is in this field and talks aviation all the time, so I apologize if I still used phrases or words that didn't make sense to a non-aviation follower.  I tried to remember things Nick said that provoked a "uhhh huh?" look from me so if I didn't explain something well enough, shoot me an email or comment under this and I'll try to furhter explain.  I know you all back home love these updates so I tried to be as thorough as I could to let you peek into what Nick's life has been like (and why you rarely see him on our Skype sessions, hear him in the background of our phone conversations, or why he himself doesn't communicate often with you all.  I promise, he loves you all, he's just busy.  I live with him and barely see or speak to him!  Give him a week and he's all yours!!!!)

Nick's Family Visit

Nick and I were fortunate enough to have his Uncle Scott and Aunt Debbie come visit us for a week!  This was their first trip here and we could not have been more excited!!!!!

For those that don't know, Nick's uncle and aunt are like second parents to him.  His parents are not a part of his life anymore but these two make up for that vacancy tenfold.  We could not ask for any better relatives than these two.  They support us and love us just any parent would.  They go above and beyond what any parent should, let alone an uncle and aunt.  I am so incredibly blessed to have married into a family like his.  So many people complain about their in-laws but I can say with 100% honestly that I LOVE my in-laws!

Their visit seemed to fly by but we made the most of it.  Nick only had the weekends off work but we spent those days touring his base, visiting the National Museum of Naval Aviation, going up in the Pensacola LightHouse (it was our first time up!  And boy is that a workout!  Nothing compared to my leg day workouts!!!!).

Stairs that go up the top of the light house

How would someone survive that fall?!  

The Pensacola LightHouse is said to be one of the most haunted lighthouses in the US.  In the basement, we watched the entire Ghost Hunters episode about the light house.  So neat!  I want to do the Ghost Tour at night here!

Nick and his Uncle Scott in front of the T-6B Texan II, the plane he flew in Primary Training

Explaining about his helo's engine

Professor Nick explaining how the helo works

Nick explaining the areas of his base

Nick and Scott in his helo as he explains it all to him

During the week, Nick's family and I headed to the beaches.  It was really great to spend so much time with them, alone.  We only see them when we go home and it's always so busy.  We're usually around at least five other people so it's not real quality time.  It was so great to spend so many hours, relaxing by the beach, and just talking...hearing stories about Nick's childhood and his family.  I truly cherished these days with them.

Bushwacker of course!

Bud Platinum

Nick had an early flight and was able to join us for the last half of the day.  So of course we stopped for sno cones!

We spent our evenings going out to dinner, sitting at home having adult beverages, and going through old family photos!

Lunch view

Lunch

Nick's family's homemade amaretto, over ice.  Delicious!

Of course we had dinner at McGuire's.  And what's a McGuire's outing without an Irish Wake?

Lunch on the beach

This also happened to be Nick and my first visit here as well!

Wine and delicious spinach artichoke dip!

I had never seen pictures of Nick pre-high school but he dug out a huge box of photos he took from his mother's abandoned storage unit and we went through them.  Um, can you say adorable?!  He hasn't changed much at all!!!!!!!

It sucked saying goodbye to them after such a great visit but we're happy we'll be seeing them in August when we venture home and again in late August when they head back for Nick's winging!  I truly am blessed to have this family in my life!

Anniversary Trip: Disney World

Sadly, I'm back from the most magical place on earth.  If you read my previous post, then you'll remember that Nick surprised me with a trip to Disney World for our anniversary.  I was originally bummed because we had to postpone the trip, but it ended up being the best thing for us!
First of all, with our original plans, Nick was going to request leave for Friday (because they certainly wouldn't grant him anymore than that.)  This would allow us to arrive late Thursday night and have all day Friday and Saturday at the parks, and possibly some of Sunday, depending on his schedule on Monday (which would knew would be intense because he's just in that crazy part of training.)
We decided to postpone until Fourth of July weekend and it was the best decision ever!!!!!!  The 4th fell on a Thursday and Nick's leave was approved for Friday.  This allowed us three full days at the parks and Sunday we didn't need to rush out of Orlando because that Monday, Nick only had an 8 hour class, which meant he didn't need to study or prep Sunday night for a flight like he normally does.  Not to mention, he's passed the super crazy stressful part of Advanced which means he was fully able to relax and thoroughly enjoy our little vacation.

We had an amazing time!!!!  I honestly cannot begin to describe how awesome our weekend was. Wednesday morning, my sister packed her car, including my two dogs, and headed back home to Alabama.  I took Mom to the airport and said yet another emotional "see ya later".  Then it was home to pack and go pick Nick up from base.  As usual, the Navy can't allow things to go smoothly so we headed out of town later than we had hoped and arrived at our hotel around 2am (ET).
{{Our hotel was so nice!  Nick found it and was really worried what it would look like.  Although the pictures and location seemed great online, it was significantly cheaper than the hotels surrounding it, so we wondered what mess we might be getting ourselves into.  But the worrying was for nothing.  We cannot figure out why it was so much cheaper because it was so nice.  It is located in Downtown Disney, right on the edge of all the shops, bars, and restaurants.  It's also the closest to Disney World parks (which meant we were the first dropped off from the shuttle after leaving the parks and the last picked up on the way to the parks, which was awesome!)  We had a room in the tower with a view of Downtown Disney and Epcot on the 25th floor and it was amazing!  So for anyone traveling to Disney World, I suggest checking out Buena Vista Palace Hotel and Spa.}}

Our park passes!  (Nick got to pick our characters)

We bought park hopper passes on base before leaving because they're 50% off the regular price.  And if you've been to Disney, then you know these passes are far from cheap.  These passes allowed us to visit Epcot, Magic Kingdom, Animal Kingdom, and Hollywood Studios as many time as we want in four days.  Unfortunately, Magic Kingdom had blacked out these military tickets on the 4th.  I was super bummed because fireworks are some of my favorite things ever.  And the Fourth of July is definitely my favorite holiday.  Leading up to the trip, I was so excited to see the fireworks over Cinderella's Castle on the 4th.  But that couldn't happen :(  I was pretty sad and Nick was trying to find some fireworks displays out in Orlando somewhere so we could watch them but we weren't having any luck.

Thursday the 4th we woke up and headed to Epcot.  It was so awesome to see the Epcot ball, something I've only ever seen on television!  While walking around the gift shop searching for Minnie Ears (of course I had to have them for my first trip here!  I don't care that I'm 28 years old, I love Disney!) I overheard someone mention fireworks.  I then asked a Disney employee and sure enough, Epcot was also having their own fireworks display!  Cue excitement!!!!

Nick and I wandered the park, grabbing fast passes when we could and waiting in other rides' lines.  It was an awesome day and you couldn't smack the giddy child-like smile off my face if you tried!
Later in the day, Nick saw that Belle would be posing for pictures with guests in France.  Despite how incredibly hot he was (Nick gets hot VERY easily and is miserable when he's hot), he suggested booking it across Epcot to find her.  I asked if he was okay with doing it and he didn't even bat at eye and said "Yeah, why wouldn't I be?"  Oh the things he does for me ;)  We made it across the park in time to see her and my trip was made!!  She is definitely the best princess, in my opinion.  After getting my picture with her, she asked "Is this your beast?", pointing to Nick, and we had him join us for a picture as well.

Afterwards, we wandered around World Showcase, which is a really cool area that portrays the culture and cuisine from countries such as France, Germany, Italy, Mexico, Norway, China, United States, Japan, Morocco, United Kingdom, and Canada.  Each place has buildings and landscaping to represent their culture, as well as various restaurants of their unique cuisines and of course gift shops.  We had a really good time walking through each country.  I even got to see Snow White during this!  (She too, asked for Nick to join us in a picture asking "Is this your prince?").

Nick in the Japanese Garden

After taking in the countries, we went to claim a spot for the fireworks show.  It was AWESOME!!!!!!  It was the best fireworks display I've ever seen.  The fireworks were perfectly coordinated to music and they honored our country so well.

This was by far the best Fourth of July I've ever had.  I was with my absolute best friend, in the most magical place on earth, watching a phenomenal fireworks display, and celebrating my anniversary.  It truly doesn't get any better!

Friday we headed to Magic Kingdom and I was just in awe of Cinderella's Castle.  I've seen it all over...the beginning of every Disney movie, in television shows, in movies, and here I was, standing in front of it...walking through it!  With meeting Belle and standing in front of the castle, my trip had been complete.

We spent the rest of Friday wandering around Magic Kingdom. We had breakfast in Gaston's Tavern (of course his cinnamon rolls are ginormous!) and I even got to go inside Belle's library!!!

The rides were fun and we managed to hit everything we wanted to.

That night, we again claimed a spot to watch the evening's entertainment.  It started with an awesome Electrical Parade.  It's just large lighted floats and characters strolling down the streets towards the Castle.

Afterwards was Celebrate the Magic.  They projected images on Cinderella's Castle and it was amazing.  My iPhone camera didn't capture it all that well but it's definitely something everyone should see!

Following that was a fireworks show. I thought Epcot's were the best I'd seen but this display put that to shame!  This was AMAZING!  So incredibly patriotic!  The Castle again had images upon it with music perfectly set to the fireworks.  It was the best thing ever.  I was on cloud nine!  Between the 4th and this day, I was just overwhelmed, but in a good way!

Friday night we made a plan for Saturday since we wanted to hit two parks in one day.  We'd start with Animal Kingdom, hit the rides and attractions we wanted to see and then head over to Hollywood Studios.  Having a plan in place was the best decision ever.  It made tackling these two parks in one day so easy.  We didn't even get to Animal Kingdom until about noon and we were finished at both parks by 7pm!  We ended the trip with Rock n Roller Coaster and it was by far our favorite ride.  We are roller coaster junkies and unfortunately, these parks are geared towards smaller children so they don't have a lot of the extremely fast, upside down type coasters.  But this was one of them and it was so awesome!  The entire coaster is a limousine, indoors, and in the dark (for the most part.)  You take off at an insane speed (for my STL friends, you shoot out just as fast as Mr. Freeze at Six Flags.)  Then the coaster flips you upside down and whatnot all the while you have various Aerosmith songs blasting from the speakers next to your head!  As you go throughout the ride, various signs are lit by black light as if you're driving down the streets of LA on the way to a concert.  I mean, what's better than a coaster with Aerosmith blaring the entire time?  Nothing, that's what!

That evening, we headed back to the hotel, cleaned up, then headed to Downtown Disney.  This place was so fun!  It's just a large area with various bars, restaurants, shops, and entertainment.  Every other bar/restaurant seemed to have a live performer out front.  We finally picked a restaurant to have dinner, settled on the second floor patio, and enjoyed a freaking awesome performer.  He performed everything from classic rock to current mainstream music.  We had a great time talking about how amazing this trip had been, talking about our future, and enjoying the evening.
Afterwards, we walked around the shops and just enjoyed the atmosphere.  If you're ever in Disney World, definitely plan to spend a night at Downtown Disney.  I wish we had spent more than one night there; but now we definitely know where to go when we come back.  And our hotel is the perfect location for that!  It's also nice because it's open until 2am so even after the nighttime entertainment ends at the Disney parks, you still have time to head here. I wish we had known that on our first two nights!

After we got back to our hotel room, we changed into comfy clothes, opened a bottle of wine, climbed in bed, and toasted to the wonderful past two years and to an even more exciting third year!

Sunday we decided we didn't need to head back to the parks.  We had accomplished everything we wanted to.  Instead we headed to the local mall so that Nick could visit Apple (we don't have one in Pensacola) and get his phone fixed.  For the past 5ish months, his sleep/wake button on the top of his iPhone 5 doesn't work.  Which means no turning it off, no locking it, and no screen shotting.  It's been rather annoying for him.  But we were in and out within 10 minutes with a new phone.
We decided to grab lunch at the food court before hitting the road.  Upon checking out what they had, we saw they had a Cheesecake Factory.  It's one of our favorite chain joints so we decided it was a must.  It's vacation so we indulged in oh so bad for you food (I got the Macaroni and Cheese Burger....a burger topped with cheddar cheese and a giant patty of fried mac and cheese!)
With our bellies full, we headed home.

The trip home wasn't that bad.  We stopped in Enterprise, Alabama to pick up our two exhausted dogs and then continued on our way home, arriving back in Pensacola around 8pm.


This was the best trip ever.  This was actually Nick and my first getaway vacation as a married couple (other than our honeymoon) and it was a great one!  I love Disney and love being a little kid.  When it comes to amusement/theme parks, Nick is just as much a little kid so he had a blast too.  We thoroughly enjoyed this time together and it was great to finally get this time with him. The last two month have been so incredibly stressful for him.  We really haven't seen or talked to each other outside of the necessary "Let's pay the bills", "What do we need from the store?" "What's your schedule tomorrow?"  (that last one is always a stupid question because it's inevitably a 12 hour day followed by a long night of studying).  Nick was finally able to relax and smile and laugh this weekend.  We were able to be our silly and cuddly selves.  I was finally able to hear all about what he's doing in training and discuss what our Navy life will be looking like in the next few months.

I cannot thank Nick enough for preparing and planning this trip.  Even though it was our anniversary, this trip was more for me than him.  Yes, he had a lot of fun and loved seeing me so happy, but if he had his way, he would have visited Harry Potter at Universal Studios or possibly some other city (Vegas?).  But it's just like Nick to be incredibly selfless and put me before him.  But don't worry, he had a lot of fun and I made this trip worth it for him as well.


As for gifts...mine to Nick is a secret to you all.  Sorry.  As stated in my card, Nick told me to pick a cotton t-shirt from the gift shop.  Unfortunately, the only shirts I liked were small children's shirt.  I might be tiny but I'm not THAT tiny.  They'd have been belly shirts with my long torso.  So the t-shirt was nixed but we each got a beach towel (which works out because living the beach life and always having so many guests, we realized we don't have nearly enough beach towels.)  We also added an ornament to our collection (we buy an ornament for almost any occasion...one for each duty station, each vacation, each experience, etc.).  As mentioned earlier, I also got some Minnie ears.  And for my last souvenir, a beautiful Belle mug to drink my teas (and rare occasion of coffee) out of.  (I'm still on the hunt for a Chip tea cup.)

Thank you, Nick, for a fabulous weekend!  It honestly could not have been any more perfect!  I will always wonder why God chose you for me, but I am forever grateful!  I know life for you has been incredibly busy and you barely have time to sleep and eat, so I truly appreciate you taking the time to plan this all for me and for us.  I'm so happy we were finally able to experience Disney World together!!!  It was a perfect first weekend getaway!  I Love you!!!!

[To view all our photos (because I don't use Facebook too much anymore) you can check them out HERE.  I warn you, there are a LOT because I also use this sight as a third back-up system for my photos.  But you can skip through the phases of photos you might not find interesting such as all the DinosaurLand pics I took for my brother or all the firework pics if you aren't into that sort of thing.)