Becoming a 2nd Lt.

Friday was the day!
The BIG day!
The day when Bud became a 2nd Lt. in the United States Air Force.
The same day we would announce the gender of our little one.
Bud had a secret plan.
The first family member to tear up during the ceremony would prompt Bud to remove a handkerchief from his jacket.
The color of the handkerchief would indicate the gender of Bitsy Hitzy.

Bud's Brother MH and I pinned his butter bars
onto his jacket.

His Father & Mother put his new epaulettes on his
shirt.

Bud's mom pretended to sniffle while attaching the new epaulette....

prompting Bud to pull the handkerchief:

In case you can't see that....
It's a PINK handkerchief....
We are having a GIRL!

After a moment we were able to continue with the Commissioning portion of the day...

Bud's brother who commissioned into the Army
a few months back was able to swear Bud in.

.....do solemnly swear....

Presenting 2nd Lt. Bud!

Directly following the Commissioning Ceremony is the First Salute Ceremony.

It's a tradition that the first enlisted member who salutes an officer will be given a silver dollar.

Bud was allowed to select who he wanted to give his first salute to on this special day, since we were making this day about all the people who helped him get where he is it only seemed right that his younger brother give him his first salute.

Having both of his brothers play such a big role in this day made it that much more special.

BROTHERS!
BH, MH, Bud, TH

3 Generations

The Brothers & their Mothership

And last but not least a picture with my wonderful husband whom I'm so proud of!

A college graduate, a 2nd Lt. and a
Father-to-be all in such a short period of
time.

All these new titles and yet my favorite is:
Loving, loyal, hardworking husband.
All the rest will be easy!

That evening we had a Commissioning Party for Bud at a local coffee bar our friend owns.

He let us use the entire backyard space to setup and hangout.

Despite the humid weather, everyone seemed to fully enjoy themselves.

Just as we were bringing the last items into the apartment after the party the sky opened up and the rain poured down.

God's timing was perfect, it always is!

I hope you all had a Blessed Saturday!

Bottle of Wine

Friday the 13th was the Colonel's Cocktail Party for the Commissioning Seniors!

We finally have a nice picture with the
Colonel and his wife!

Colonel's wife always goes out of her way to provide a beautiful spread of food!

And there is always tons of mingling...

And at some point during the night Colonel gives each Commissioning Senior a personalized bottle of white or red wine:

Each bottle is inscribed with:
Congratulations
Second Lieutenant
United States Air Force
Colonel....
Commander of Detachment 825

I am really having a hard time believing that in just a few days my husband will in fact be a Second Lieutenant in the USAF!  In a few days the house will be full of family and friends come to celebrate and honor all of Bud's hard work!  In a few days 15 new ROTC cadets will become Second Lieutenants in the World's Greatest Air Force!!!!

I hope you all had a Blessed Tuesday!

BBQ & Seniors

**This is a repost (originally posted 5/8/11), this was lost when blogger was down last week**
Every semester's end AFROTC goes out to Salt Lick BBQ to celebrate the seniors.
This semester was no different, but it was better!
We had a wonderful private room all to ourselves!
Plenty of room to mingle and an entire fenced off area outside for people to hang out until dinner started.
We started the night by getting our BIG GROUP Picture...

All Seniors in front please!

Finally it was time for the food.
We settled in for a family style meal.
All you can eat of the best brisket, sausage, and my personal favorite RIBS!
Sides included smashed potatoes, beans, and slaw.
While everyone ate, couch stories started.

Couch Stories literally involve a couch, each senior is called up and pictures are flashed up on the screen behind them while friends come and tell stories about them.
With 15 commissionees (one of which being Bud!) we had a lot of good laughs.

We ended the night by honoring Colonel.
He will be moving on to a different assignment as well, in Hawaii (I'm jealous!)
Bud and the other seniors/commissionees brainstormed what kind of going away gift they could shower him with.
I made a suggestions and fortunately, it sparked the idea for the final gift.
He is the biggest baseball fan you could ever meet so the cadets all signed a Home Base Plate.
A friend of the Detachment custom made a display case for the Home Base with a spot for a flag on top.
This flag was flown over the Capital Building here in Austin.
There were 2 plaques that were engraved for the case...
One was the Detachment 825 logo and the other said "Home Base is where the Air Force Sends you".

I think for the first time in history, Colonel was speechless.
You could see it in his face, how genuinely loved he felt.
He will be missed, but I have hopes that the new Colonel will leave as much a memorable mark on the remaining classes as Colonel did for us.

I hope you all had a Blessed Wednesday!

Blues & Ballgowns

I apologize profusely for my inability to keep a regular schedule lately.
I had every intention of sitting down and writing about all the fun activities I did this weekend, but somehow time slipped by.
So here we are.
Tuesday night.
Post grocery shopping.
Post dinner.
Pre-cleaning.
Pre-showering.
Pre-bedtime.
I think I'll spend the next few days filling you in on the weekend and then Friday I'll be back with Bible Verse Friday!
I always hate missing BVF, it helps set my soul straight and the feedback from everyone is always a nice reminder that I'm not typing to hear my fingers clickity-clack against the keyboard.
Anyways, let me move forward.

Friday was my pamper me day.
Every year Air Force ROTC has a formal dinner.
And every year I take that opportunity to go spoil myself all day and get dolled up for the night.
This year was no exception.
I booked my appointment at Frenchy's Beauty Parlor w/ my wonderful stylist Kallie.
First we did my highlights, it'd been a year since I'd had them done, fortunately she did such a good job last time, they grew out rather inconspicuously.
Then she touched up and added a few new layers to my hair.
Finally she styled it for the big night.
The thing about Kallie is that the entire time she asked me questions about what I would like, but I saw her grin each time I told her, "Kallie, I trust you, do whatever you want".

The finished product

After Frenchy's I grabbed a quick bite to eat and headed to my 2nd appointment of the day.
A Mani/Pedi at Embellish!
They know how to make a girl feel like a girl.
They everything is elegantly decorated and the big tv's hanging on the wall play nothing but chick flicks.  While I was there I caught the end of The Wedding Date  w/ Debra Messing & the beginning of My Girl.
It was heavenly.
Finally it was time to come home, do my make-up and head to dinner with the hubby.

How handsome is this man standing next to me?

He's a little excited about Bitsy Hitzy

It's so much fun seeing everyone dressed up and mingling before and after the wonderful dinner.

AT & KS are getting married July 30th!
They are a great couple and we love hanging out with them.

KS & TV have less than 2 months until their big day
and we can't wait to walk down the aisle again as
bridesmaid & groomsman to support them!

The great thing about fun couples and ROTC and knowing each other for a few years.

It's always fun to be around these people!

KS (the female) didn't think she'd been in enough photos
yet so she jumped in on this one ;)

And let's not forget Bud & his Best Friend JF

JF made dinner so much fun.

A few birthdays ago we gift him a fork like this:

Airforkone
source

Well he brought it and exchanged his proper dinner fork with this one in honor of his pilot's slot!

That is a completely random, but just an example of how much fun these people are to hang out with.

All in all as far as our LAST AF ROTC dining out goes, I have to say it was nearly perfect.

Only 38 more days until Bud Commissions!

I hope you have a Blessed Tuesday.

Brother's 22nd Birthday!

**warning this post is photo heavy ;) 

Today is my kid brother's 22nd Birthday!

Kid Brother & Biz

Biz (5yrs old), Dad, Kid Brother (15mos), Mom

Telling Santa what we wanted for Christmas

Kid Brother (5yrs old) & his Dutch boy haircut
Biz (9yrs old)...excuse my entire look
back then....I don't know what my
parents were thinking.

Biz (11yrs old), Nick (6yrs old) & The Dad
I was in Indian Princess' & Kid brother was in
Indian guides....my Dad made our outfits
and the banner (yes he sews)

Watching the torch for the 1996 Summer Olympics
Biz (11yrs old) & Kid Brother (7yrs old)

Family Reunion in Michigan
Kid Brother (7yrs old)
Biz (11yrs old)

Kid Brother's 3rd Grade Picture (9yrs old)

Kid Brother's 5th Grade Picture (11yrs old)

2004 on our front porch
Kid Brother (15yrs old)

Air Force Boot Camp 2008
Airmen Brother (19yrs old)

February 2010- Last time I saw my brother in person
Kid Brother (21yrs old) & Biz (25yrs old)

Kid Brother (21yrs old)
Electrical Apprentice serving 6 months in Afghanistan.
Thanks for your service Kid Brother, you make me PROUD!

Let's wish my little brother a Happy Birthday!

Thanks for helping me celebrate my little brother today!

I'm going to get back to my cleaning (just carpet cleaned the bedroom!)

Boys are slowly getting back to 100%

I hope you have a blessed Wednesday!

P.S. I'm linking up with Farmgirl Paints Linky Party here using the below picture of my sad, not feeling so great pup.

Shutter Speed of 0"3 aka 3 seconds  I had to hold VERY still!

P.S.S.  I think I just added a way for people to get an RSS feed should they prefer that method, it's in the right hand column & titled Biz's Buzz :) 

Bits & Pieces

As I reflect over the craziness of the past few weeks I realized I have left out a few bits & pieces here and there.
So tonight I'm going to catch you up on some of the small things that went on here!
The beginning of December marked the end of something else.
In July, around the time I really started blogging here I also started journaling.
Nearly every night I wrote about the things that I can't write about on here.
So for 4-1/2 months I wrote in my beautiful purple journal and now I have switched over to my clean fresh white journal.  It's not much to you guys, but it's pretty exciting for me.

On December 3rd I had my first "photo shoot".
I have so much to learn!
A fellow AFROTC cadet asked Bud if I would be willing to take a senior picture for him that he could gift to his Mom for Christmas.
We set a time and place and I showed up nervous and afraid that I wouldn't capture what I wanted to.
Well here it is:

AZ's Senior photo!  This is on the UT campus on 21st Street.
That's a fairly iconic fountain and having the UT tower in the
background was a requirement ;)

That evening we went out with ROTC for the end of semester tradition...dinner at Salt Lick BBQ.
If you aren't from TX you don't know what your missing.
If you are from TX or you plan to visit TX you should definitely put it on your places to eat!

Sitting next to one of our FAVORITE couples!  JF & MS!

 

Partial group picture.  We had to take 4 separate photos just to get all the people, approx 100!

On December 5th Bud & I celebrated our 9 year dating anniversary.
April will be our 7 year wedding anniversary.
It's amazing how time flies when your having fun!

Our 1st Valentine's day, 2 months after we started dating.

Finally, last night was the Senior dinner at Colonel's house.
At the end of each semester they have the seniors over and honor the ones who graduated.
It was a lot of fun to dress up a little and socialize with everyone.

MS & JF at Col's...JF was supposed to be taking a photo of us.

Take 1....MS being a creeper haha

Take 2..a good photo!

Bud & CM 1 of our December Graduates & Commissionees 

AZ & Bud our other December Graduate & Commissionee!

Anyways there are some bits & pieces of the last few weeks.
We just finished watching the ORIGINAL 1980s version of TRON.  It was Bud's first time....it's amazing to see how different movies are now.
Time to settle in and watch some of Season 2 Dexter with the hubby.
I hope everyone has a blessed Saturday night.