Winter Formal

Saturday night was the Winter Formal for Jordan's Battalion. It's kind of fun to get all dressed up on occasion!

Home Brew

So Jordan and I finished our 2nd homebrew just in time for Thanksgiving. We tried an Oktoberfest beer this time. The first time we tried it we did an American Ale. I like the American Ale better but Jordan likes the Oktoberfest better. Of course! There are so many different kinds to try so we have a lot more to do! It is really fun making your own beer so I suggest it for anyone that enjoys good beer! It is way more flavorful than kinds you can buy. It is pretty easy too. Of course you can make it harder by putting in the ingredients and hops seperately but so far Jordan and I just buy the kits that have all the ingredients already put together. Anyways, I took some pictures so here they are. The 1st picture is when we transferred it to the tub with the spicket so we could bottle it. The second picture is when it sits and ferments. The fermenting process kind of makes a mess as you can see. I think it is less of a mess if you get a glass tub (called a carboyle I think) instead of a plastic bucket. It also usually smells really awful but this Oktoberfest smelled like fresh baking bread!

Pinning Ceremony

Well, Jordan is officially a 1st Lieutenant! The battalion commander did the pinning today. All of the drill sergeants came so there were more people there than I thought there would be. I got to take off the old patch that goes on his chest and put the new one. You are supposed to punch it after you put the new one on so the blurred picture is me punching him, ha! Then the commander put the new one on his beret. He got a signed document from the U.S. President (that is what is in the frame). The commander made a short speech and that was basically it. He said Jordan was not a "butterbar" anymore. I guess that is kind of a deragatory term they use for 2nd Lieutenants since the insignia is a yellow/gold bar (see my post below). The army has very odd and strange culture!

1st Lieutenant!

Today Jordan officially gets promoted to 1st Lieutenant (from 2nd Lieutenant)! The Battalion commander is going to pin him today at 5:00 pm (the official removing the 2nd Lt symbol and putting on the 1st Lt one). He is excited to be bumped up to the next ranking. From what I can gather I think it is like not being a freshman anymore. Hopefully, I can get a good picture of the pinning and post it without embarrassing him too much!

The 2LT insignia: A gold pin goes on the cap and the beret. It is a gold patch on the ACUs (the camo uniform) The 1LT insignia: It is silver on the cap and beret but a black patch on the ACUs.

Thanksgiving Weekend!

We had a great Thanksgiving weekend this year! Jack, karol and Jason came to stay with us. All the food turned out great on Thanksgiving, we watched lots of football and had a great weekend! Karol and I went shopping the day after Thanksgiving and I got a Christmas tree so now we finally have one! We found some other good things too with all the crazies! Karol had never been shopping on Black Friday since she is always around boys so I hope she had fun! I didn't really take that many pictures but here are a few from the weekend. We hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving also!

Dr. Appointment today at WP

Well, Jordan just finished up his appointment at West Point. Overall, it is just another wait-and-see approach...we sure are getting used to this! The Dr. walked in, looked at Jordan's "tumor" and said "well, I've never seen that before!" haha! He was pretty sure it was going to be joint fluid that had just accumlated there for some reason but when he went to drain it, blood came out instead! Jordan said he pulled out about 1 1/2 big syringes of blood! Jordan said it was really painful. The Dr. put lots of compression wraps around his knee and wants him to keep it straight and to stay off of it for 14 days. His theory is that something traumatic happened underneath where the big lump was and that is why blood accumulated there. Staying off of it and keeping it straight for 2 weeks should be enough time to let whatever happened to it heal. After that Jordan is supposed to begin running and training again. If the "tumor" recurs then we will have to go from there...he said he didn't really know what this was all about even though he had this theory since he has never seen anything like this before.
Jordan has also not been able to stretch his IT Band like he has been instructed to-there is way too much pain. The Dr. was also baffled at this, saying that he has never heard of somebody not being able to stretch it while also being able to run and squat and lift weights. He is hoping that it is related to this "tumor" thing. So overall we don't really have any answers. Hopefully, the tumor thing doesn't come back and this will be all there is to it!

Back up to West Point

Well I guess it's not going to be quite as easy to get the "tumor" (that's just what we call it jokingly, it's not really a tumor) on Jordan's knee fixed. The doctors here would not even look at Jordan's knee because he did not have surgery here. It's so dumb! Sooo...he has to fly all the way back up to West Point just to have that surgeon look at him. Jordan had an MRI done a few days ago and his appointment at West Point is November 12th. Jordan bumped into somebody at work whose dad is a doctor-this guy said he was pretty sure it is not bursitis but some kind of cyst that just got filled with fluid. But I guess we will find out next week what the "tumor" really is!