Thursday, December 17, 2009

The Belated Thanksgiving Recap

Thanksgiving is one of my favorite holidays. Partly for the simplicity of it. Sandwiched between Halloween & Christmas, it's refreshing to just get together with family and eat. Seriously, what's better than that? No glutton-fueled children begging for candy while running around in costumes that either have ten inches of fake muscle or way too much skin showing; no pressure to get just the right gift for everyone on your list. Just people you love and seriously delicious food. Sign me up!!

Tim & I went to visit his parents for Thanksgiving this year. We left all of our work behind, loaded the car and made the drive with surprisingly little traffic to compete with. Tim's dad is now working in Pennsylvania so the opportunities to get together with his parents have slimmed down a bit compared to the past few years. When we arrived we were pleasantly met with the aroma of Thanksgiving dinner in the air. We had a great time catching up and enjoyed more belly-laughs than we've had in a while.
The day after thanksgiving, we ventured down the the National Naval Aviation Museum in Pensacola. Tim was in HEAVEN! The museum is almost 300,000 square feet and there are airplanes in every direction... he literally didn't know which way to turn!

The family shot :o)
This plane, an A-7 Corsair II, is the plane Tim's dad wanted to fly in the Navy and is also the namesake of Tim's favorite plane, the F4U Corsair.

Checking out the exhibit on the USS Enterprise.

That's a Corsair in the background, Tim's absolute favorite airplane.

There was also one the floor... that he could touch!

We have about 15 variations of photos with Tim and this plane.
He talks about its curves like it's a woman.

Tim & his dad in front of a F-4 Phantom II,
another one of Tim's all-time favorite aircraft.

It may have been at this point in the day when Tim turned to me and said, "You must really love me to put up with airplanes all day." He then promised that I could pick out the next five Netflix movies. Score!

Tim's dad standing with a T-34, the same kind of plane that
he flew while he was in flight school in Pensacola.

Tim with his mom :o)

I crawled into the cockpit of this A-7 and it's a
wonder that I ever got out! They're tiny!!

This picture was taken in the Cubi Bar Cafe. It was originally from an Officer's Club located in the Philippines and was the actual bar on a base that Tim's dad visited with his Navy buddies. When the base closed down they tore it apart, shipped all the memorabilia to the US, and rebuilt it in the museum. They have a ton of squadron plaques that have pilots names and call-signs, including a pilot whose last name was Swift with a call-sign of "Not So".

Tim with a F4F Wildcat, the museum has three of them.
Tim really loves these classic WWII warbirds.

I jumped into the shot too!

Tim & his dad standing in front of the A-4 Skyhawk Blue Angels. There's one of these at a rest stop on I-10 that we pass all the time and Tim has told me the name so many times that I've memorized it.

For this photo, I was instructed to get the apple, the tiger, and the sharks mouth nose art in the frame. Tim tells me this is from one of the most famous and recognizable airplanes in the world, it's a P-40 that flew in the AVG Flying Tigers' Adam and Eves squadron in China.

This is us on what Tim calls the "business end" of the F-4. Tim tells me he could have spent the whole visit touching it. He insists on going back as soon as possible!

1 comment:

Dad said...

Emily/Skip,
Thanks for capturing Thanksgiving and the day at the Naval Air Museum. It was great!

Dad

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