Oh Yes It's Navy Night, And the Feelin's Right....

Seven years ago, while we were out to dinner in Park City on the Monday eve of Chaplains Seminar with the Whitakers, we talked about how fun it would be to have "Navy Family Night" with any of the Navy Chaplains and their wives there for the conference. The next year we made it happen. Its beginnings were humble, as our numbers were small and not everyone was always able to attend, but it has grown into something very special.

We look forward to this night every year, but this year, Cliff and I were committed to do the VIP tour and dinner, so we thought we'd miss out entirely. Lucky for us, most everyone was also available on Tuesday night, and they wanted to wait for us. We love these guys!


We were back at Buca for the 3rd year running. They always treat us so well. We outgrew that little room at the Olive Garden years ago, PF Chang's was just too loud, this is perfect.



Each couple orders a dish, and we pass them around and around the table until everyone gets a taste of whatever they like. You're drooling, aren't you?

For the second year in a row, we used Jen's "speed dating" suggestion, and every 15-20 minutes, we picked up all our stuff and moved 2 places to the left. This way we all had the opportunity to visit with everyone, instead of just the people seated near us.

We had a record number of candidates this year, and following Chaplain Vance's suggestion, we treated them all to dinner to give their student budgets a rest.

Once again, I got pictures of all the lovely (new and familiar) faces around the table:



New



Familiar. Still rocking the student thing.



More familiar student faces.



Familiar. Still plugging along. Getting close.



Familiar. Very Familiar. Anyone on the board reading this? Rick is ready.



Familiar Fleeties. The wives couldn't make it. =^( We missed you ladies!



Our partners in crime



Hubba Hubba



More, awesome partners in crime.



Lovely old timers ;^)



Perfectly seasoned. We're so thrilled they came back to join us. They make retirement look good. I light up inside when I see these two. He was our Chaplain before Cliff was a Chaplain.


And of course, the outtakes:






We're already looking forward to next year...hoping some more of you will be here as full-fledged Chaplains, and that those who couldn't come due to operational commitments, etc. will be able to join us, too...and not just so we have more ways to split the bill.