Jake and Shannon: November 2010

Jake and I had a great week this past week! Jake is progressing through his first phase of flight training and doing very well. He was one of three guys chosen to be the commander of a convoy operation and did pretty well. I worked on setting up our baby's room and sewing a car seat canopy. I had to keep unpicking my stitches and redoing things because I was making up my own pattern. I even added a mesh window so no one I don't know can touch our baby, but she can still get some air. After all the frustration and time, I think it turned out pretty well. We did have a little scare on Monday when I was having bad contractions and cramping, and thankfully my doctor assured me everything was fine with our baby. Already our little girl is being a stinker! She definitely takes after her daddy. :-)

Thanksgiving was fabulous this year! We went over to our neighbor's house and had Thanksgiving dinner with 3 other couples. I was in charge of the turkey because non of the other women had ever made a turkey before. I hadn't either, but I figured I'd rather take the plunge and try it out then leave it in the hands of someone else. I knew I could at least make a decent turkey. :-) Jake was so excited to play football with a bunch of guys from our ward. He asked me to come watch him so he could show off. Jake is a really great football player! He made 6 interceptions and a couple of touchdowns. All the guys were very impressed and made sure I knew about it on Sunday. I am so proud of my man! (It's so great to be married to a stud!) I originally asked Jake to pull out all the nasty parts of the turkey and rub the seasoning in the cavity, but he went and played football, so I was left to do it on my own. Wow! I almost met my match squaring off with that turkey and its nasty parts. I couldn't bring myself to touch any of the giblets or stick my hand in the cavity, or even touch the turkey for more than 5 or 6 seconds, so I'm sure it would have been a sight to see me holding a spatula and tongs trying to prepare this turkey for Thanksgiving without touching any part of it. Since I couldn't bring myself to stick my hand in the cavity to rub in the seasonings, I just kind of dumped the seasonings in there, picked the turkey up and shook it around to hopefully get the seasonings where they needed to go. Everyone liked the turkey, so I guess I did a good job. We were able to do a video chat with Jake's family later Thursday night and it was really fun to see everyone.

There were four football games Jake watched over the weekend, and all four of them lost! Some of them by only one point during the 4th quarter. He was devastated! We had to give talks on Sunday in Sacrament meeting, and he said it was because he watched football instead of preparing his talk that they all lost. I thought it was pretty hilarious that not just one or two but all four lost!

Jake and I are doing fantastic here in Alabama. It's hard to get into the holiday spirit here because I'm not used to having a dry christmas. The last few days I've been telling Jake we're going to put Christmas up, but then I forget because there's no snow outside! The average temperature here is 78 degrees. Of course it wouldn't feel like Christmas!

Oh I almost forgot! I have been dreading the day I'd see cockroaches in my house, and the other day we had our first! I was cleaning up my house when I glanced down and almost let out a scream! There was a dead cockroach on my living room floor! YUCK! I picked it up with our dust pan and threw it away in our outside garbage. I haven't seen anymore since then, but everyone keeps telling me they'll be coming for me. YIKES!

There are also parking places all over the base for expectant mothers. I thought it was so funny the first time I saw these. You definitely wouldn't see these parking places in Utah because they would always be full and women would be competing to get these spots first because they're right next to all the buildings! The funniest part is they're almost always empty. I feel like royalty every time I park in one of these. ;-)

Nasty cockroach!

Car seat Canopy

Mesh window

Well we made it to Alabama. I never thought it was going to happen, but it finally did. We had a pretty nail biting time up until Thursday the 21st because we still hadn't gotten our orders and were scheduled to move on Monday the 25th. We had our families coming up to help us load everything in the truck on Saturday the 23rd, and someone else was moving in the day after we moved out, so either we were going to Alabama or we would be homeless. That is not a fun thing to worry about. We also found out we couldn't even rent our truck unless we had orders or we wouldn't be reimbursed for our expenses. How frustrating! Our orders finally came on Thursday after Jake did some calling around to get any information at all about them. We sure said a prayer of gratitude when we finally got them in Jake's email.

The packing and loading went smoothly and the guys were able to figure out how to fit everything in the 16' truck we got, but it was a really tight squeeze. We filled every inch! Jake and I had a little party the last night we were in our condo by moving our TV upstairs in our bedroom, watching The Karate Kid, and eating ice cream on our mattress on the floor before going to bed.

Monday morning we woke up early and drove to Hill Air Force Base to get the approval for our DITY (Do It Yourself) move. We were supposed to have gotten the paperwork taken care of Friday the 22nd, but when we were about 15 minutes away they called and told us we'd have to come back Monday because their systems had shut down. What luck! Needless to say I was livid because we had been driving for 45 minutes already and I had had it with the run-around from the army. We had to turn around and drive back to Logan, losing a lot of time we could have spent packing and cleaning our house. Luckily everything went without a hitch when we got there Monday morning, and we were able to return to Logan before we thought and finish last minute loading and cleaning. We left Logan around 2:00pm and headed up through Bear Lake to our new home.

We drove 6 1/2 hours the first day through snow, windy roads, high wind speeds, and bumps. We stopped in a little town called Wamsutter, Wyoming after about 5 hours of driving to fill up on gas, and as I walked around the back of the Budget truck I saw Jake's scriptures sitting on the tailgate. I asked Jake if he'd recently put them there, and he said he hadn't. He left them on the tailgate when we left Logan! We were both so surprised they had survived and looked as good as if they were sitting on the shelf back home! We both thought it was a miracle and also a sign. We arrived at the Warren Air Force Base in Cheyenne, Wyoming pretty late that night. The room we stayed in was fantastic! There was a full kitchen, a living room, and two bedrooms!

Tuesday the 26th we found breakfast at a cute little bagel shop that made awesome bagel sandwiches and burritos. I wish there were more shops like that around! We headed out of Wyoming through Nebraska. What a boring drive. There was nothing but grass blowing in the wind. We did see a few oil rigs and drove past a pasture with what looked like 10,000 cows, but other than that it was very long. We bought a few books on CD to listen to, and boy were we both glad we did! There was one point when Jake seemed to lose his mind a little and started singing and dancing around in his seat. It was hilarious and made for some good entertainment for a an hour until his throat started to hurt from all his bellowing. J We drove about 8 hours and stayed in Lincoln, Nebraska for the night.

Wednesday the 27th we drove through the rest of Nebraska, Iowa, Missouri, and Arkansas. About Missouri the scenery started to get pretty and was much more interesting to look at. Lincoln, Nebraska was actually a beautiful city and had the cutest houses and yards! I told Jake I wouldn't mind living in Nebraska if I could live in one of these adorable houses in Lincoln. We drove for about 8 hours and my ankles and hands started to swell up really bad after sitting down for so long. The wind also blew pretty hard all day. Apparently we were catching the tail end of a big storm that had just come through. We stayed in Hardy, Arkansas that night and had a hotel room with two full beds instead of a king or queen to save some money. Jake got a better night's sleep than he has in awhile that night sleeping on two different beds, because I wake up at night and move around a lot.

Thursday the 28th we drove through the rest of Arkansas, Tennessee, Mississippi, and stayed in Montgomery, Alabama that night. I really enjoyed driving through this part of the country because it was very beautiful. Memphis was a huge city! We got a little lost driving on their roads because their roads are crazy, but we eventually found our way thanks to Tom-Tom (I don't know what we would have done without Tom-Tom sometimes.). Jake and I went to Waffle House for dinner that night and it was pretty good. We thought Waffle House was unique to this part of Alabama, but little did we know it is everywhere! There are more Waffle Houses in Alabama than McDonald's!

Friday the 29th we drove into our new home, Fort Rucker. I was amazed at how beautiful the base was as we drove through the security gate and into the base. There are trees lining the road for a few miles until you get into the "town" area, and then it opens up and is very well kept. There are also helicopters constantly flying overhead. When we got onto the base we had a few hours to kill, and of course the first place Jake and I went to was the Aviation museum. He was absolutely enthralled by all the helicopters, and it was pretty amazing. They have the progression of the very first planes and helicopters flown in all the wars and the stories behind their construction and use.

We ate lunch in the PX, which is a mini mall, and then checked into our new home. I was so excited when we drove up and saw it. It's a four bedroom, one story house. There is lots of storage space inside, including a storage shed in back and a car port storage. Jake and I don't have enough stuff to fill it up! Jake and I were both surprised to find out there are several guys Jake went to school with here, as well as some guys from his unit in Utah. Several of them came and helped us unload our truck. We were invited over for dinner Sunday night as well as Monday night by several friends, and everyone was more than happy to give us advice and help us adjust to our new home. We were invited to the ward Trunk-or-Treat and chili night, and it was fun to socialize with people in the ward and meet new friends. Jake and I both left excited to be here.

Saturday the 30th we took the Budget truck to Dothan to drop it off. We were relieved to be rid of it because it was a pretty crappy truck. The tire was worn clean through so you could see the metal wiring in it, and the brakes on the trailer didn't work. When we got back to Ft. Rucker, I started to unpack while Jake went around and tried to figure out where he was supposed to be reporting to. His orders didn't give us any information except we were supposed to be here the 31st. I got the kitchen and our bedroom unpacked by the time Jake got home.

Sunday the 31st we went to our new ward, the Ozark 1st ward, for the first time. There is a ward and a branch here with 90% of the ward being from Utah. Everyone was so friendly and accepting, willing to help out and offer any service or advice we needed. I am amazed at how we have been treated since we've arrived here. I think it's partly because everyone was once in the same place we are and knows how it feels. We ate dinner with the some friends that night and really enjoyed socializing with them. We played Settler's of Catan for the first time, and it was a really fun game! Jake and I are going to need to invest in some board games and invite friends over.

Jake found out he needed to be at PT (physical training) at 5:15am Monday (Nov 1st) morning, and when he showed up they gave him his class schedule. We thought we were going to get a few weeks or months to get settled in before flight school started, but apparently the army had other plans without telling us. Jake has now been in school for 3 1/2 days, and I am left to take care of everything else. Jake came home Monday after class and was really stressed out because everything was new and there was so much to do still. They told him he needed to take care of all the in-processing stuff on his own time, like transferring over health care, putting in our DITY move papers, and getting finances taken care of so we could get paid. He was pretty upset about everything.

Tuesday I tried to get most of the paperwork and tasks done, but spouses can't do anything here without their husbands! It's ridiculous! Whoever said being married gave you rights lied. Jake had to give me a General Power of Attorney just so I could look at his paycheck and get our vehicle registered. It also took me 5 hours to complete what would have taken me 30 minutes to do in Logan! Yuck! And people want the government to have more power.

Jake came home on Tuesday and was much happier and felt better about things, mostly because I took care of several of them, and he didn't feel so overwhelmed. Jake has a hard time with change, and I think the abrupt immersing into flight school right after we got here didn't help. He's feeling better about things though. I spent the rest of Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday unpacking our house, putting our giant desk together, and setting up the internet. I'm pretty much finished except for the baby's room, but that can wait for a few more weeks.

Funny story: The internet guy was getting our modem set up in the other room and said, "Oh my Lord!" He then asked, "Ma'am, how much do you know about your computer?" I said I didn't know much, to which he replied, "I have never seen a download speed this fast before! Usually I get around 15mb, but yours is pushing 45! I want to take your computer home with me!" He performed the test 3 times just to make sure it was accurate. I laughed very hard at this because I remember dad being so impatient growing up with how slow the internet could be, and wanting the fastest we could get. I guess it rubbed off onto me too because I've always had to have the fastest internet connection I could get too, price isn't a factor. I think people here in Alabama are a lot less tech savvy than in Utah. They're also more friendly and laid back, which I both like and dislike.

So far Jake and I are loving this place. It's different from Utah, but we were expecting that. Everyone here calls me sweetie, ma'am, or darlin', and the roads are CrAzY! I got a blessing a few days ago that said Jake and I were sent to Ft. Rucker to further the gospel and be examples, and flight school was the avenue for that to happen. I know we've been through some pretty trying and crazy weeks, but being here now is so worth it, and I know the Lord is blessing us! We miss our families, but we know we are where we're supposed to be! We love you all!