Here is a picture of Ben's division, 173. The three guys in the from are his RDC's (recruit division commanders). The two guys in the "dixie cups" (white sailor hat) are petty officers and the guy on the far right is the chief.  Behind is the division of guys that Ben went through boot camp with, they are all special ops guys, hence the reason for no girls... girls can't do special ops in the Nevy. The flags that they are holding are representing all of the achievements that they earned. They had more than all the other divisions, no wonder they made the Hall of Fame!

     Here is a better picture of Division 173, Ben's head is in the red circle that I drew, back center.

                    Here is a close up of the previous picture, Ben is circled.

                   Here he is moments after graduation! So handsome.

Halleigh wasn't too sure about Ben in this outfit, but we wanted to get a picture of them in sailor outfits together. 

So Ben got to stay with us Friday and Saturday night, he had liberty for the whole weekend, which was a pleasant surprise! Ben woke up on Saturday morning and had RED RED eyes and he thought that it might be pink eye. These are the glasses that they gave him for boot camp, and they are a different prescription than he had in his other glasses that he wore the day of graduation, and it turns out after a day of wearing the boot camp glasses, the pink eye was just really bad eye strain. So the rest of the weekend, Ben braved the stares of all of greater Chicago and wore his crazy brown glasses.

                  We went to the beach and it was freezing, but beautiful none-the-less.

We couldn't find Halleigh's jacket, and so she is wearing one of my mom's sweaters.  You can tell by her red nose and rosey cheeks that it was cold. brrrrrr

           I love this picture, because off in the distance you can see Chicago.

There's the sailor touching non-pool water for the first time in the Navy.  He said that they didn't get wet at all while in boot camp, except for in the pool.  I thought for sure they would have done something in the lake, being so close to it and all.

Here is when Ben pulled Halleigh out of the lake, as she was running in.  You can tell by her pants that she is wet up to her knees.  Ben was skipping rocks and Halleigh wanted to as well, but instead of letting the rock go, she flung herself forward and right into the freezing water.

                               Mom and me

Here is Ben carrying Halleigh back to the car wrapped in his jacket trying to get her little feet warm from her dip in the lake.

The next day we decided that we had seen all that we were going to see in Waukegan, and we headed in to Chicago, to Navy Pier, the Magnificent Miles, the Hancock building, and the bike trail. Here is Ben on Navy Pier.

                           Mom and Ben reading about the origins of Navy Pier.

Inside the Crystal Garden at Navy Pier there were these crazy water fountains that both mom and Halleigh loved. They were really funny watching the water shoot out, seemingly randomly.  As you can see in the last picture, they got a huge kick out of this water!

It was good to let Halleigh strech her legs, because she spent most of the weekend needing to sit still, in the car seat, stroller, or graduation.  She was a real trooper!

One of the most fun things for Halleigh was the ride on the carosel with Ben.  By this time she was IN LOVE with Ben and wanted to be by him all the time, so a ride on the carosel was like heaven for her.  I kept trying to get a picture of her looking at him while they were riding, because she kept looking up at him and smiling.  It was so sweet, but it was going to fast, and thse were the only two good pictures from their ride.

                         She is having the time of her life!

This was at the top of the Hancock building.  Halleigh would NOT go in there without Ben, so they had some window washing time together also.

Whoa Ben, don't let go!  When Miles and I were in Chicago last, we took pictures like these of us, and it is sweet that now Halleigh has a picture like these also.  It will have to be a family tradition.

                             Whoa! Don't look down Halleigh!

Cute girl! This was on the bike path that runs along Lake Michigan in Chicago.  I took this picture right before we saw a horrific head on bike accident.