Falcons, friends and family

Jake braved the freezing cold at his first football game this weekend!

We were super excited to go to the Air Force vs. Navy game back at Matt's old stomping grounds in Colorado Springs. Not only was this Jake's first football game altogether, but it was mine and Matt's first time together in Falcon Stadium -- Matt was always on the field while I was in the stands. And did I mention it was the Navy game? So yes, very excited. What made the weekend even better was the fact that my sister's family just moved to the Springs, so we'd get to spend some quality time with them as well. And then we found out that some of our favorite friends, the O'Bryants, were flying into town for the game as well so we'd get to watch it with them. We were pumped!

The only thing that dampened the enthusiasm a bit was the forecast. It was 81 degrees at the Academy on Wednesday and 74 the next Monday. But that Saturday? The high was 34. On October 6th, mind you. It was in the 20's when we got to the stadium! Luckily, I've learned the magic of layering in recent years and we were all bundled up nice and toasty. (PS- I totally recommend this baby snowsuit, which I bought last year on clearance in Santa Monica for a whopping $10.)

It was a really great game, which Air Force dominated right up until the final three minutes. If not for the multiple fumbles in the red zone and the two missed field goals and the questionable clock management in the end, they wouldn't have lost in overtime. So sad. But the thing that I love so much about Falcon football is that it's about so much more than football. We were reminded of that yet again after the game, when both academies took turns standing respectfully behind the other as they sang their alma maters. USAFA's alma mater reverently honors those who gave their lives in the service of the Air Force and our country. As you hear those words and see those future Air Force and Navy officers standing together, you picture them and their alumni, standing together to fight a different battle. And suddenly, the football game with the intense rivalry seems a little less consequential. And you get over the loss a little.... at least until you get to your car :)

Jaker's first hot chocolate. He loved it!

Shaun, Amber and beautiful little Corianne!

We then spent the rest of the weekend watching all of conference and hanging out with April, Alex and Tasha. Jakey and Tasha played and played, Alex and April cooked up some amazingness, and Tasha was enthralled with "Uncle Map." (Which is only fair, I suppose, since she preferred Aunt Ashley during our trip to Virginia last year.) It was a lovely little getaway.

Hang Gliding

Hang gliders and paragliders are a common sight at the point of the mountain. We've driven by as they've played on the hill so many times and thought it looked like a fun game. So when we found out the Air Force was moving us to Utah, hang gliding was one of the first things that made it on our PCS Party's to-do list. I made good on Matt's birthday present a week after the big day, and it was definitely worth the wait!

Our lesson started off with the basics of how to carry and control the glider, and by the end, we were taking off up the hill, banking and turning, and flying up to twenty feet above the ground. It's crazy to hold onto a big wing, take off running, and in a couple seconds, be stepping on air. That feeling of flying -- even at a lower height -- is absolutely exhilarating. The whole morning was so much fun!

29

Matt told someone he was turning 30 this year, but luckily, he has 365 more days of youth than he thought. He turned the big 2-9 a couple weeks ago and got a double party out of it. We pre-celebrated with my family the night before with a special dinner, presents, cupcakes, and the whole shebang. Matt's big birthday present -- and his birthday present for the next 19 years -- was his triathlon bike and gear that we bought this summer. I brought the bike up, put a bow on it, and wrapped the rest of his gear to help him remember that I really did give him something for his birthday. (A few years ago, I pre-gifted a big gift and gave him a shirt on the real day, and he proceeded to tell everyone that I gave him a t-shirt for his birthday. Silly boy.)

Then I surprised him by actually gifting him something else: a hang gliding lesson the next morning. Hooray! I even whipped out my long-lost popsicle stick building skills and stole an army man from my brothers to create a miniature hang glider. Sadly, the weather conditions on his birthday weren't quite right so we rescheduled hang gliding and went out to breakfast at Kneaders instead. Matt spent the rest of the morning playing with Jakey and really, that's the best way to start any day. We then grabbed lunch at Texas Roadhouse and dropped Matt off at the golf course for a round of nine with his brothers. Then it was football and the famous feathery fudge cake with the Davises. It was a great birthday.

PS- We're watching our church's General Conference all weekend. Follow along with us at generalconference.lds.org :) We are especially excited about this announcement, which lowered the required age for missionary service. Five years ago at this time, I had just turned 20 and was two months away from graduating from BYU with a B.A. in Communications. I wished so badly that I could serve a mission right then. A year later when I was finally the right age, a mission just didn't feel right anymore. I am so thrilled for (and admittedly, slightly jealous of) all of the girls like me who now have a greater opportunity to serve. This change will bring so many blessings to so many people.

Crash and Fall

Normally when I don't blog for awhile, it's because I've been on a last-minute vacation or something else super fun like that. I wish that was the case! It's been a very long two weeks, aside from a few happy days spent with Liz and her babies in Idaho. My grandma was in the ICU, we had problem after problem to sort through with our house, we got bummer news from a doctor, we actually canceled a vacation, we continued to deal with little issues from our PCS, and...

The most unfortunate of all non-life-threatening events occurred. My external hard drive, containing all of our pictures and videos since the beginning of time, crashed. This has pretty much been my greatest fear since as long as I can remember. As a little girl, I used to worry that our house would burn down and we would lose all of our pictures -- the loss of pictures being the problem with that scenario. Basically, this is my worst nightmare.

I've always made sure to have everything stored in at least two places, but with the move, I got horribly behind schedule. Most older pictures are backed up, most newer ones are not. (Luckily, I still had a small sampling of pictures from Jake's birthday and party on my camera just in case, because I'm paranoid like that.) The biggest tragedy is that we only have about 10% of our videos backed up. All of the cutest little videos of my sweet baby... I just can't even begin to tell you how absolutely devastating this is to me. I'm so sick about it.

It's a rather long story, but the short version is that the hard drive had a rapid decline and actually crashed while I was trying to copy things over to a new hard drive. (Just the most important folder even, since I worried that copying over too much at once might overwhelm the drive.) That makes this all the more frustrating since it's not like I was just naively going about my merry way when I lost everything. The hard drive is currently with professional repair hope #1, after which we'll take it to computer whiz #2, and if all else fails, we're prepared to pay inhumane amounts of money to the data recovery company that we selected after hours upon hours of research. The internet tells me that with my model and symptoms, even the data recovery experts only run a 50/50 chance of getting my files back. We have every extremity crossed that at least our most favorite videos of Jake can be recovered. At the risk of sounding horrifically dramatic, I might die if it doesn't work.

On a happier note, we welcomed fall by driving the Alpine Loop post-computer-apocalypse. We loved taking in the scenery as we played at Aspen Grove. The colors are so vibrant and beautiful this time of year! On a sadder note, it's sort of freezing and I'm really missing warmer weather and beaches and Disneyland and California and our home and, well, you get the idea. Like I said, kind of a bummer two weeks. But! We're going on a little road trip to one of our very most favorite places in the entire world this weekend and are very excited about that. And we're all happy and healthy and doing great overall. And the mountains are so pretty right now...