We Got Tagged!

Our blog has been tagged by our friends, the Zeltwangers from Aberdeen, SD. Their own blog is at stroozwanger. We now need to supply 8 random facts on our blog along with the RULES...-Players write a post with eight random facts/habits about themselves.-At the end of that post, they "tag" eight bloggers to write similar posts, including the rules. (Our blog-sphere of influence is very small, so we'll do our best to tag some of you who have yet to be tagged). The players then leave a comment to tell the "tag-gees" about the game. So here it goes, 8 random facts about the Carpenters...

1. During Kelly's time working with Dr. William Gray at Colorado State University on predicting rapid intensification of hurricanes, she was able to spend a week at the National Hurricane Center in Miami. While there, she was able to fly on a P-3 hurricane hunter aircraft into a developing tropical disturbance in the Gulf of Mexico.

2. Scott carries a small photo of his grandfather, Dayton Reeves, and his plow-horse "Pat" plowing a potato field in Michigan in 1939 to remember Dayton and to remind him how lucky he is every time he gets tired of work.

3. When Nolan was born in Honolulu, Hawaii, the state of Hawaii planted a tree for each new baby born in the state. So, somewhere on the Ala Wai Golf Course in Waikiki is a tree planted to celebrate his birth! We just hope he gets a native discount when we take him back there sometime!

4. Our dog, Reba, was "overflow" from the Cheyenne, Wyoming animal shelter in 1998 and was sent to the Humane Society in Fort Collins, Colorado. We were living there at the time, while Kelly finished up her M.S. degree at Colorado State University. So, while the rest of us found a new home in Cheyenne this year, it was a homecoming for Reba!

5. My favorite book is Following the Equator, by Mark Twain. This is his journal during a journey around the world. Another favorite book is the one put together for my Grandma Mary Carpenter's 100th birthday in 2004. She is 103 and going strong, and an absolute treasure to our family. If you have an elderly grandparent, please take this time while you can to get them a grandparent book, or just spend a few days with a video camera asking them questions about the past. I am so grateful to my cousin Tammy and to my father for doing these two things, respectively. The ficticious works of Tom Bodett, Patrick McManus, and Jimmy Buffett are also some of my favorite books to pick up at any time.

6. All of our boys ended up with names that somehow relate to Texas and family. Nolan-from Hall of Fame baseball great Nolan Ryan. Barrett and Travis-from William Barrett Travis who was the Commander at the Alamo. Actually, this was not really planned but we just liked the names in general. Nolan's middle name is my first name, Barrett's middle name is from Kelly's paternal grandfather, and Travis' middle name is from my paternal grandfather.

7. Although Scott and Kelly first met at the 1996 American Meteorological Society Annual Meeting in Atlanta, we did not start dating until we both worked as Summer Interns for the Tulsa company which eventually sent us to Kwajalein for our time in the Marshall Islands.

8. I learned to sail near Little Point Sable on Lake Michigan in a family friend's 12ft Snark sailboat, and continue to love sailing my parents similar sailboat every time we can get out on Lake Huron at the family cottage in Michigan's Upper Peninsula. Sailing was one of my favorite outdoor activities during our time living on Kwajalein and the sailing community was fantastic about teaching me some of the finer points. My father taught me to sail, but before doing so, he had to spend many hours repairing the sail with the handyman's secret weapon, Duct Tape (here's to you Red Green fans!). You see, we were the only folks to use that sailboat and the sail spent all but one week a year in the rafters of the garage! So far, our sail for the boat in the U.P. is holding up much better!

Tagging:
The Rees'
The Mullens'
The Scheels'

July 26th, 2007: More CFD Fun with Travis!!

As Thursday rolled around, we decided to meet up with our friend Russell Nimitz since he was down at Frontier Days for work. Kelly and Russell worked together on the Q2 Noon News back in Billings, since Russell works for the Northern Ag Network broadcasting TV and Radio Agricultural reports across Montana and Wyoming. We had a "fair" lunch and then headed over to our Rodeo seats.

Below are some more pictures from the rodeo.

Below are a few shots of Nolan and Barrett on the Midway at CFD. You can see the dark clouds moving in which ended up dumping 2+ inches of rainfall at our house! The boys are showing off their new hats too. Oh, and the Mackinac Island (and all of the Eastern UP of Michigan) Chamber owes me a thank you letter...since we were asked by a gentleman about vacationing on Mackinac Island (he saw the boys shirts) and I gave him the "spiel" about all there is to do and see "up north" in Michigan.


Nolan and Barrett did get in 4 rides before the onslaught of rainfall. I was paraticularly impressed with them riding the spinning dragons! And Barrett's little plane didn't have a steering wheel, but he sure looks ready for Six Flags or Cedar Point!

July 25th, 2007: Enjoying Frontier Days on Cheyenne Day 2007

Nolan, Barrett and I got up early today to partake in our first Cheyenne Frontier Days Pancake Breakfast. The Kiwanis Club puts on this event Monday, Wednesday and Friday of CFD Week, and it is quite the undertaking.
According to the CFD website, "This year, the volunteers will serve up more than 100,000 flapjacks made from 5,000 pounds of pancake mix, cook-up 3,000 pounds of ham, serve 9,200 cartons of milk and 520 gallons of coffee, along with 630 pounds of butter and 475 gallons of syrup!"
We were probably more than 1000th in line this morning when we arrived at 645am and once 700am rolled around...the line literally never stopped moving so it was not a bad wait at all. We were definitely eating by 720am. They even had cub scouts and their parents to help people like me with little kids. After you get your napkin and fork, 4 different stops in line produce the breakfast shown below!


They have lots of seating on 2x8s which the boys did a great job eating off. Below are a couple of pictures from breakfast. The event is held downtown at the Depot, and you can see the clock tower at the Depot in the second picture.




Now, Nolan did great and helped Barrett by eating some of his ham slice...but check out how much Barrett put away in the picture below. He was a machine...almost completely finishing his three large pancakes!

After breakfast, we returned home and Travis and Kelly were awake. We played awhile and waited for the 1000am start to the aerial display by the Thunderbirds. I am glad to have successfully taken some photos earlier in the week, since the display was a little different for the actual 30 minute airshow.


The highlight for us today was the incredible pass one of the Thunderbirds made RIGHT OVER OUR HOUSE and VERY, VERY LOW coming from the back to the front. I was trying to video a bit of 4 of the jets flying together when the pass occurred. We were all incredibly frightened by it and I think all had hands going to our ears as fast as we could. All I remember is grabbing my ears and looking right into the red back end of the engine! We also had another less-low pass by two of the Thunderbirds that was low enough to make the air "crackle" from excess noise. We were very happy to have stayed home and not battle the traffic over to the show-site. It was really cool! Below is a shot of the family watching the Thunderbirds.



After naps and lunch, we headed over to the Park and Ride at the mall to get to the Wyoming Air National Guard static display air-show. We did not expect the almost 1 hr wait for the bus-ride to the base, so Kelly and Travis decided not to push it in the heat and decided to walk around the mall and wait for us there. Below are some of the pictures we took once we reached the show area.


These are the "buggers" who constantly buzz our house, which may be why Nolan looks like he just turned around from lecturing this WY ANG C-130.


We thought this C-17 was cool since it came from Mississippi...and the picture of the boys in the jump-seats below is in this aircraft.

Barrett and Nolan as close as we were allowed to the Thunderbirds on the tarmac.











Nolan decided to take this one over and jump in the right seat.




Inside the main hangar, NASA had a few displays and as you can see below, the boys enjoyed pretending to be headed to space!

July 24th, 2007: Travis' first dinner out.

We decided to take Travis out to dinner for the first time Tuesday night. He did great.



And here is just another shot of him curled up in his chair snoozin'.

Travis' First Doctor Visit

Travis had a great check up today at his doctor's office.



All is going well and he continues to eat and sleep well. He is already quite used to all the Thunderbird noise and even napped through it today.

Thunderbird Mania!!!---Day 2

Another great day of watching the Thunderbirds. When they came out for the afternoon practice, I was mowing and let's just say they scared the heck out of me (I already used "frick" in a post this week, but "frick!"...I wish I would have saved it for this post since that was about what came out of my mouth when the roar overcame the mower noise!).

Below are my much improved efforts in photographing this incredibly awesome display. We can't wait for tomorrow and Wednesday!


These two were coming from the airshow grounds north over our subdivision and just east of our house.

This is the lowest pass they make over the subdivision during the performance. This picture is looking just south of west up our street. Click on this one for sure to see the full image.



These two are some of my favorites with the four F-16C's. In these pictures, they have just passed to the east of the house in the diamond formation, made a hard left bank in formation and came out of the turn in this formation. They were very close to passing directly over our house when I took these from the back yard.


Finally, as the others were preparing to land after the afternoon practice, these three flew directly overhead (I was literally looking straight up to take this picture) and made a few passes over Frontier Park and this afternoon's rodeo performance. We later saw these three again over downtown as we went to Travis' first check-up.

As you might imagine I have dozens more, but these were the best. I'm glad I figured out the focus issue and also how to take several shots in a row.

Coolest House Location...EVER!

OK, first...Travis and Kelly are home from the hospital this afternoon (some pictures are in the previous post).

Getting closer to the reason for the post...the Thunderbirds arrived for their Wednesday Frontier Days airshow and have been zipping around over town all day. We had two of them do a rather low pass over the hospital as Travis first hit the "open-air" outside the hospital...again...coincidence...we think NOT!

Possibly due to an executive order by Dick during his moments as Commander in Chief Saturday morning! Oh, and Kelly reminded me two or three made a pass directly over the house as Travis arrived home!

We were wondering what would be the special reminder day of Travis being born...with Nolan on Pearl Harbor Day, and Barrett on MLK day (and the birthday of his great-great Grandmother). I guess we now have something definitely special to remember by.

Now, if you ever want to visit us, we highly recommend the Sunday through Wednesday of CFD since apparently the Air Force Thunderbirds due a bit of practicing prior to the actual Wednesday show. We arrived home with Travis to find the 7 F-16Cs ALL OVER THE FRICKIN' PLACE!!! Just at the end of the practice we saw several passes, some high and some really, really low over our subdivision (and one or two directly over the house!). At the end of the practice, 4 of them came nearly over the house and out across the northeast part of town (great view from the house) to form up their diamond shape (in picture above). They then did a hard bank and went by just to the north of the house with smoke on. I guess they do this pass over the afternoon rodeo at CFD. Following the pass, they split up and come back east near our house on approach to land. It is really, REALLY cool!

I borrowed the picture above from the AF, but will have to see if any of my pictures turned out very good. I'm hoping to get video of the diamond formation passing the house on Monday or Tuesday if they are out practicing again! May try to get a picture of the kids on the deck with the Thunderbirds behind them too!

Cheyenne Frontier Days Welcomes Travis Walter!

Travis Walter Carpenter joined us at 112AM MDT Saturday, July 21, 2007 and President George W. Bush was so excited that he handed power to Wyoming's own Dick Cheney (coincidence...we think not)!

He (Travis, not Dick Cheney) weighed in at 7 lbs 12.5 oz and was 19 1/4 in. long.

Kelly and Travis are doing well.

Here are a few of the pictures from very early today, and this morning when Nolan and Barrett were able to meet Travis! As always, click on the photos to view the full file size and save if you wish.

PS: Nolan, Barrett and I ran over to Frontier Days for a short time at midday since it was Broncos Day at CFD. We had a very warm wait in the hot July sun, but Nolan met "Miles" (the Broncos mascot) and received an autographed photo. He then went back and asked Miles for another with "Happy Birthday Travis!" on it after he explained that his new little brother was born today. Miles was very hyper so you can see Nolan was a little shy, and Barrett wanted nothing to do with him.

July 19th, 2007: Finally some house pictures...

Well, we've just celebrated 3 months since moving to Cheyenne and about 2 1/2 months in our new home. I know I promised a few pictures from around the house months ago, but here they are finally. We decided to get some pictures hung up in the basement and main floor on Wednesday before the new baby arrives (we know by Monday for sure, if not between now and then), so I thought it looked good enough.







Above: Heritage Room (aka Living Room) looking toward the front.

Above: Heritage Room looking toward the back yard.

Above: Looking from Heritage Room through the Dining Room and into the Kitchen.

Basement Staircase with photos on the ledge.

Above: Family Room in the basement.

Above: Family Room in the basement standing by the air hockey table looking the other way.

Above: Guest bedroom suite (bathroom with jetted tub not shown) with the day bed (it has a trundle bed too).

Above: Guest bedroom looking from the window back toward the family room.

Above: Just a different angle from the guest bedroom toward the family room, including our little office area.