The nature of Bobby's squadron is that there are always people coming and going home from deployment. Five people here, fifteen people there, ten people here, twenty people there. Often we have small groups coming home on different days but all in the same week. Although this makes the home coming no less sweet, it does make it nearly impossible to put together any kind of fan-fare that many times. Bobby's squadron is not the norm, however. Most pack up the entire group, deploy for x-number of months, and then ALL come back on the same plane and on the same day. For them, "Christmas" comes just once a year and they all band together to celebrate in style. Well...as much style as you can in a Navy hangar. :)
That all being said, Bobby happened to get on a flight home with one of these large squadrons and I got to crash their party. I took some pictures and a bunch of video so you could come along for the ride. Enjoy!
Not very exciting video but you can see that they're opening the hangar so we can all watch their plane land. An announcement came on that said, "Attention on deck! Announcing the arrival of flight XXX to NAS Whidbey Island." Or something close to that. :)
You can kind of see the plane landing in the background...
The plane pulling up to the hangar. A good video until the woman in front of me got excited with her sign. :)
Sorry for all of the pictures of random people but it was SO touching to watch others' excitement.
This video is long because I didn't know when he would be getting off the plane. I should have known he would be last! I apologize that it's really bumpy too. I was trying to walk up to the plane and didn't want to stop recording and accidentally miss him. Click on the link to view this video. It was too long to input into the blog.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i8qMA2BzsKY
You know Bobby's happy to be home when he lets me take a picture of him....AND he's actually smiling. A banner day!
We recorded this last time but it never gets old. Here is Wrigley and Gracie's reaction to Stanley coming in the door...
Welcome home, Bobby!!
Yeah BOBBY! Now help Lara pack :)
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