As I said in the February blog, March was a busy month. Holly and I went to Houston Space Center. It was interesting looking back at history.The only difference is we were there when this was all happening. We remember the first time man went into space and orbited the earth. We watched the first time man landed on the moon. Yes it was strange thinking about this while we were looking at all of the displays. We had a great time looking back in time.
This is the moon rover and the two astronauts on the moon. The government would probably make you a good deal on the rover...you just need to pay the shipping cost to get it back here.
They took us on a tour of Johnson Space Center which is next door. We were able to go in the building where they have mock ups of the space station for the astronauts to train on. This is one of the prototypes for the new moon rover. Below is a robot they are developing to perform work outside in space to cut down on space walks, making it safer for the astronauts.
These pictures here prove that as you get older you start to get shorter. OK, maybe not that much shorter. They had a Ripley's Believe it or Not display. I don't remember what the big chair was but the other is of the world's tallest man. He was 8 feet 11 inches tall. As you can see Holly is a little on the short side.
On another trip with Bill and Penny, we went to see the Battleship Texas near Galveston. It's a self-guided tour and they have signs explaining where you are and what different areas were used for, including the prophylactic room. Now that is almost self explanatory, but if you need a better explanation you can e-mail Holly. This is Bill looking forward from the gangway. It's amazing how much fire power they had on this ship, plus they carried two sea planes.
This picture is looking towards the stern from the bow. This shows the first turret, the bridge and fire control above that. I was able to climb into the first turret and get this shot of how the shells were loaded. Now when I tell you that this was a very small area I do mean small. There were two seats for the gunners, one on each side. The area they had to sit in was smaller then a stall in a public bathroom. To get into the turret you have to climb under the rear of it and then climb up through a small hatch.When I stood up in the hatch with my feet on the deck I was half in and half out of the turret. Once you get that far you need to climb a ladder about four feet to get to the gunners position. Then if your like me, you sit down and think "how the heck am I going to get out of here".
This is Holly standing next to some smaller shells for some of the other guns on board. As I said, they had a lot of guns on this ship . Of course after exploring this mighty ship from stem to stern and bridge to keel we had to find lunch down on the Gulf and a good lunch it was.
On February 20 our granddaughter Chloe became on of the many Air Force's newest Airman. The Air Force has basic training in San Antonio Texas which is a 2 hour drive west of us. It was a no brainier to pack up and move to a RV park in San Antonio. Her mother and two sisters flew in along with Brianna's boy friend and Krista's friend Kim and her family. Chloe's dad and his wife also flew down, This was a two day event. On Thursday they had the "Airman's run and coin presentation" and on Friday the formal graduation. This is Krista (Mom), Mikayla (sister), Grandpa, Grandma and Brianna (sister) holding Chloe's sign.
This was a special day as they graduated the last 8 1/2 week training class and the first 7 1/2 week class for a total of 1060 Airman recruits. They started with all of the recruits running into the stadium to the cheers of the family and friends. Each "flight" as each unit is called wore different colored shirts so you knew ahead of time what color shirt your airman was wearing. After they went past the viewing stands they ran way out on the parade ground and back past going the other way. After this this they changed into their ABU's and marched back in for the coin ceremony.
After all of this we were able to go find "our" airman and get short hugs (no more then 5 seconds) Grandpa cheated on this; what they going to do, and a quick peck on the check. That is Mom to the left wiping away tears, Grandma going in for the hug and big sister Bri wiping away the tears on the right. We are so proud of this young lady and everyone else that graduated that day. My Dad was a Tech Sergent in the Army. My brother was in the Navy, I was in the Coast Guard, Her Uncle Mike (our son) was in the Marine Corp as was her Dad. Now with Chloe in the Air Force I think we have them all covered.
Here are the sisters three. I know that big sister Bri and younger sister MJ are both very proud of Chloe and will miss her not being home all the time. But now days with cell phones and computers it is a lot easier staying in touch then when I was in.
This is Chloe and her Air Force coin that she worked so hard for. That is something she will have forever along with all of the experiences of basic training.
This is just one shot of the formal graduation. I have many more but just imagine a field covered by 1060 airman in Air Force blue and that's it. A lot of marching, they took the oath one last time (I guess all of the other times were for practice so they wouldn't screw up this one), and they sang the Air Force song.
Here she is all dressed up and grown up. We were out somewhere with her and someone referred to her as an adult and it really caught me off guard. I always thought of her as Chloe my granddaughter. But they were right, she is an adult. Cute, confident, and smart but still my Chloe (now Grandpa is wiping away tears). She is now at tech school at Sheppard Air Force Base in Texas after which she will go to her first duty station at Lakenheath Air Force Base in the UK. How cool is that?
Here I am with her and I think my shirt says it all. I know that Grandma and Grandpa are very proud of her and we both know that she will excel at whatever or wherever she goes during her time in the Air Force.
That's it for now. We have about three more weeks here then we head home to see our grandson Cameron graduate from high school and then we will be off to Libby Montana. So you are all dismissed and may carry on. Just be sure and report back here next month and visit with us again.
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