Project 366: Week 37

September 11 - September 17

Sunday: Sunrise through the rain beyond the pier.  What a beautiful morning!  I love looking for the rain!  I am thankful for God's handiwork.  He could have made the whole world a monotone, but he paints with a million colors!

Monday: Sophia reading to Mercy while they wait to go to the beach.  I am thankful for the ability to read.

Tuesday:  What an awesome experience: to see the Blue Angels!  They were spectacular!  I am thankful for the opportunity to enjoy such an amazing performance.

Wednesday:  I am thankful for the Lord's allowing us this time to witness his creation in different areas!  What a wonderful sunset!

Thursday:  We took the kids back to the Naval Aviation Museum.  We enjoyed some of the displays on Aircraft Carriers and took the guided tour.  The tour was paused for a ceremony to honor veterans who served on the first intentionally build aircraft carrier.  What a special thing to witness! I am thankful for my children's love of learning.  They would have gladly spend another full day at the museum over going to the beach!

Friday: We rented stand up paddle boards.  Adrian and Megan took a couple of the kids out on the boards.  Avalyn and PaigeEE actually managed to stand up on the boards for a good bit of time!  I am thankful to have gotten to try something new!  The paddle boards were a lot of fun, though they provided quite the workout!

Saturday: (Taken on Friday evening) We never managed to take a family picture on the beach, so Friday evening, we took several pictures from the balcony of our condo.  The kids especially love the goof pictures!  I am so thankful to get to spend our vacation with my parents.  It is a joy to get to spend this time together.

Vacation: Scenic Views

Well, I am so far behind, but I have been taking pictures.  Though feeding a baby, and the rest of the family, homeschooling, and house work has been taking a much higher priority to blogging.
These are the last pictures I was going to post from our vacation.

The condos across the street on the inter-coastal waterway.

A view of the pier from our condo.

Sunset between the condos.

Sunset on the beach.

(Adrian's picture)

Just after sunset, notice the moon.

Just after sunset.

Inside the atrium. (Adrian's picture)

Looking down to the ground floor from our floor. (Adrian's picture)

Vacation: The Blue Angels

While we were looking at information about the National Naval Aviation Museum on the internet, my dad found out that the Blue Angels usually practice at the Pensacola Naval Air Station on Tuesdays and Wednesdays.  We were all excited at the prospect of seeing them, but he air show was even more spectacular than we imagined!  The announcer said that the Blue Angels do not do trick or stunt flying, but precision flying.  What they do is what all military pilots need to be able to do.  The Blue Angels just do it much closer to each other.
The Blue Angels have two "teams".  One is a group of four, and the other is two single pilots.
The Blue Angels take off in formation:

Their signature diamond formation:

They fly with 18 inches between wing tip and cockpit!

The two single pilots fly by each other in very close proximity!

The two single pilots fly in formation "dirty" and the lead plane inverted.  Flying dirty means with the landing gear down and in this case with their hook down as well.  It changes the aerodynamics and makes harder to fly.

The four planes with the first and fourth inverted.

They do a maneuver called a break away, where they going from flying in close formation to each plane flying heading off in a different direction.

The two single pilots join in formation with the other four to do several maneuvers.

All six pilots approach the air field from different directions!

We thoroughly enjoyed the air show!  It is incredible to witness such amazing skill carried out in such a spectacular display.  The kids are still talking about seeing the Blue Angels even now, and hope to go back to see them again.

Vacation: National Museum of Naval Aviation

On Monday, after playing at the beach in the morning we decided to visit the National Museum of Naval Aviation.  It is a free museum located on the Naval Air Station Pensacola.  We opted to take the guided tour and learned a lot about history of naval aviation.
The kids were fascinated by the whole museum.

These were symbols used on the planes during world war 2.  The bullseye was used by all allied planes at one point.  The guide said that the British marked their planes with a bullseye with a red center, the French had a blue center, and the Americans had a white center.

Carrier Pigeons were used during world war 1!

This plane uses a rotating engine!

This picture only shows a quarter or less of the entire plane!  It was designed to sink submarines.

I really liked the yellow planes!  They were used for training pilots.

My dad in front of Bob's Flying Machines.

I love the colors!

Good advise!

We learned a little about the Blue Angels and were excited at the thought of seeing them, but that is a story for another day.

The museum has a couple of demo planes that you can climb in.

We really had a great time learning more about the different air planes and their role in the navy.