Another Visit from Santa

Santa dropped by 5355 Chidlaw on Sunday to see Brock and Grace. They were very surprised. Grace was very cuddly and said she wanted a camera and a popcorn machine. Mary Beth jumped in and reminded her we have one already in the kitchen; its called a microwave.

Brock thought he was a little too big for Santa but the old man was persistent. Brock asked for a cell phone and Santa quickly put the kibosh on that one. Mr B will love what he gets.

Daisy was not as excited to sit in Santa's lap but he could sense that she just wanted a King size bed with an electric blanket along with a year supply of hickory smoked bacon.

More Arboretum pics

Arboretum pics

Lights at the Arboretum

We went to see the lights at downtown OKC at the arboretum.

Privatized Housing Santa

Brock and Grace got to visit Santa next door in the condemned house that the privatized housing people use for special events. She told Santa she wanted a camera and a popcorn machine. Not sure what Brock told him but Mike asked for his garage back. This Santa is actually the head maintenance guy for housing.

Santa Visited 72 CPTS FMers

Ho, Ho, Ho! Santa visited the merry Comptrollers for the Squadron Pot Luck luncheon. Maj Vaughn's FM elves were surprised when Santa entered the conference room thru the back door with a bag full of presents with a naughty and nice list. There was lots of laughter and a little bit of dread for those that got to come up and sit with Santa. All of the parties are over now so its time to relax and enjoy the Holidays. Enjoy!

The Best Christmas Cookies

MB made a batch of Christmas cookies for Grace's 2d grade class this week. On the same day we had our new Dell Inspiron 530 delivered by the FedEx guy. MB was at school when he came to the door and he left a note that he was on base and if we called him we could meet him and take our package home. MB rushed to the drop off point with two cookies and picked up the package. Mr FedEx loved the cookies so much he stopped by the next day to get some more. If you want to try one then stop on by.

First 1/2 Marathon

MB & Mike ran their first 1/2 Marathon at White Rock Lake on Dec 14th. If you look very closely Mike started to celebrate a little early before he crossed the finish line and Mary Beth pushed hard and beat him by a step and one second. It was a very fun run for both of us. We both did a similar training program for over 3 months of running almost 200 miles for a total of about 40 hours.

Above you can see the leaders starting out at the gun in the front of the pack of 17,000 runners. Our chip time showed that we got to the starting line at about 9 minutes after the gun time. We made our goal of finishing close to 2 hour and 30 minutes with an average pace of 11:45 minutes per mile.

We thoroughly enjoyed the run even though the day was a little warm and windy. It started off at the American Airlines Center where the Mavs play and winded through Big D and into the North Dallas neighborhood. The Full Marathon actually went all the way out and around White Rock Lake. Along the way there were many well wishers and cheering spectators.

Some of our most favorite moments were the following:

Between mile 2 and 3 there was a guy who looked like he was from a washed up 80s band who sang "Eye of the Tiger" with a karaoke machine. One of Mike's favorites was the people with a boom box that played the Smokey and the Bandit song, "East Bound & Down"... East bound and down, loaded up and truckin', we gonna do what they say caint be dun, we gotta long way to go and a short time to git there, I'm east bound so watch that bandit run...yee haw!

Mary Beth's favorite well wisher was her friend Elizabeth who was wandering the course from mile 5 thru 9 looking for us. She found us at mile 9 and ran to cheer us on thru the last big hill.

We also enjoyed listening to the conversations of our fellow runners which kept our mind off of the task at hand but made us hate these people for not running faster.

When we got into the neighborhoods of North Dallas there were lots of folks out in their yard cheering. There was one girl playing her trumpet and a few yard rock bands too. The Rocky theme song played right before mile 6 at Central Expressway.

The run seemed to get longer after mile 7 where we could see see many runners ahead of us from the turn around point but we felt better from mile 8 to 9 as we saw those behind us. The last 3-4 miles were very long as by now we were tired and achy. The good thing is that it was down hill for the last 4 miles but still seemed very long. The sun popped out right when we had about 2-3 miles to go.

After finishing and collecting our shirts and medals we drug ourselves to the beer tent and tried to stretch out. We did not end up being as tired or sore as we thought we would so we figured we had a good training program. After we got some food and a shower we felt much better. We took off on Monday to rest which was a good idea for some resting in between other Christmas preparations. We are now fired up for the next 1/2 marathon at the end of April. Wish us luck for the OKC Memorial Run!


MBs stats: http://onlineraceresults.com/race/view_individual.php?make_printable=1&bib_num=11029&race_id=9880&type=result

Mike's stats: http://onlineraceresults.com/race/view_individual.php?make_printable=1&bib_num=11030&race_id=9880&type=result

Christmas Lights

We got in the festive mood and got outside to put up lights.

Our tree turned out lovely.

Queen Daisy

Grace has now taught daisy its OK to sleep in the recliner if the big mink blanket is on it. Its a rough life being a Vaughn dog...

Waiting for Candy

Grace V is a pro at base holiday parades. She knows that you need a bag to carry all of the candy that they throw at you. She gathered enough sugar snacks to keep her going until the 25th. Mary Beth had to throw out her stash of Halloween treats. She thinks there should be candy given out too for Thanksgiving. Maybe she can make this a law when she becomes president.

Misc Vehicles

The 552 Air Control Wing Commander and Command Chief drove their AWACS golf cart.

Security Forces had their ATV.

The Force Support Squadron Director dressed up like an elf and drove the choo choo with the school aged kids.

Tinker Holiday Parade

Today was the Tinker Holiday Parade with the Honor Guard at the front.

There were several large Clydesdales or draft horses pulling each Commander.

Santa and Mrs Clause brought up the rear.

Marshall W Cone

We thoroughly enjoyed our newest nephew Marshall at Matt and Tina's house in Plano.

He is a very busy and happy little guy. He likes to chatter and smile for all of his admirers.

Marshall shows off his Thanksgiving tummy with Uncle Mike

Panty Polar Bear 08

Brock wanted to know what it was like to jump into 50 degree water on Thanksgiving day at Uncle Matt's pool.

He quickly found out that freezing cold water makes you jump out of the pool quickly.