Email

For those of you who have been having issues emailing me, you can try kenyachui2@gci.net, or once again at justin.weaver@eielson.af.mil.

On a seperate note - I leave tomorrow, Thursday Nov. 3, to go Caribou hunting up north. Now I know some of you are saying, "Up north! How much further up north can he go!" I know, I know, craziness, but It's about 200 miles and it will take anywhere from 8-12 hours. It gets better though. I think it must be the Alaskan air that makes me even crazier, but you have to be five miles off the road before you can shoot a caribou. That means walking five miles in snow, in negative temperatures. The things we do for meat. It's -20 right now at our house and that's considered warm for this time of year. Like I said - craziness!

Anyway, wish me luck, but mostly just pray that I have a successful and safe trip. I'll be going up with two other guys and we'll be returning on Sunday.

Send me some emails.

~J

Third Day

Today I got to meet the band and crew members of the popular Christian band Third Day. They were very friendly and awesome to talk with. They are performing Thursday night at the Carlson Center and since they had some free time, we arranged to give them a tour of our base. We took them to see an F-16 and an A-10 and then we let them fly in our F-16 simulator. They also got to meet the base chapel worship team.
Anyway, I included several pictures, as well as a picture of me with the crew and band. There was 5 of the 6 band members there today. I also "snagged" a press pass, so tomorrow night I'll be going backstage to talk with them and see them perform up close and personal.
Email me sometime at justin.weaver@eielson.af.mil and let me know how you guys are doing.
Winter is here, and it's getting cold!

Jenny's Birthday! She is the BIG 23! We love her. Gavin has learned to stick out his tongue. What a cutie! Jen's not so bad herself!

Aug.29 -- Mama and little G outside of our house. It's getting cold already - winter is knocking on our door.  

Notice his cute little mohawk!  

Aug. 27 -- Gavin loves to get his picture taken.  

More fishing

Alaska is known for the outdoors, and it couldn't be more true when it comes to fishing. This past weekend I had the opportunity to go on a fishing trip to Minto Flats. They are only 40 miles away, but b/c of terrible roads it takes two hours by car and four hours on a boat to get there.
Three of us went on the trip and about two minutes after setting the boat in the water, I began to second guess what we were doing. First of all, the first mile was extremely shallow, second, we had three big guys with camping gear weighing down a 14 foot boat past it's max. Because the water was so shallow we kept hitting the bottom of the river. We were wearing waders, so we would get out and walk along side the boat until it got deeper and then we would jump back in and try and use the motor. Well we were going along and we started to go through rapids, but it was too shallow to use our motor so we had to attempt to row. We smacked into three boulders, and thought for sure we were going to sink. Thankfully we didn't, but the butterflies in my stomach sure were flying. After the mile from hell, the river became a lot deeper and after a 3 hour boat ride, we made it to camp. We set up camp in the middle of Minto flats right off of the river bank. Talk about awesome fishing. We fished for Northern Pike and they were all over the place. Our three day fishing trip was cut down to two b/c you are only allowed five fish a piece, and we reached our limit the first day we were there. The largest fish I caught was 35 inches long, but my buddy caught a 41 incher. Almost as big as my salmon. All in all, after we chopped up the fish, we came out with 30 pounds of meat for the winter ... next on my list -- MOOSE!

Airman of the Quarter

Aug. 7, 2005 -- Today I received my Airman of the Quarter for the group award from the vice wing commander Colonel Horton. The award highlights different accomplishments I've made over the last three months. I won it for our squadron, and then I won it for our "group," but unfortunately I didn't win it at wing level. Another Airman, who had been deployed twice already, won the award.

King Salmon

King Salmon -- Top, my fish was caught July 17 at 12:35 a.m. on the Chena River in Alaska. It took me 35 minutes to get him in the boat! He weighed 40 pounds. Jen caught this July 8 at around 9 p.m. on the Chena River. He weighed about 20 pounds.

7/10/2005 -- This was taken outside of Eielson Air Force Base.  

This was taken last month. Jen and I just got the prints back. We will be shipping them off ASAP. Let us know if you want a copy and I'll send you one as well.  

Our life to date

For those of you who havn't talked to us in a while, let me update you on my life. I enlisted in the Air Force in January 2004. After enduring six weeks, which seemed like six months, of boot camp, I was officially an Airman in the Air Force. I had joined the Air Force and went to basic with an "open general" job, meaning that I would pick from a list of available jobs and hope to get a good one. A lot of prayer and a bit of good luck landed me a job in Public Affairs photojournalism. After basic training I left Lackland, Texas and went to Fort Meade, Md. for four months of tech school. My wife was not able to stay with me during that time, but she flew up almost every month to visit me.
I was hoping to be stationed somewhere overseas, but as luck had it, Jen and I were sent to Eielson Air Force Base, Alaska. Seven hours north of Anchorage, 15 minutes south of the North Pole ... the town that is.
We live on base in a three bedroom house. January 27th, 2005 saw a new addition added to our family - Gavin Joel Weaver. Talk about a bundle of joy. I've been around a lot of babies, but I've never seen a baby laugh and smile as much as Gavin does. Now I know some of you are saying, "I would have thought they would have had a terrible baby." Don't worry, we thought the same thing. But God has blessed us with a wonderful new beginning to our lives.
We have now been at Eielson for a year. The hardest change to get used to is the daylight, or lack thereof. Right now we have about 21 hours of daylight, but it really never gets dark. In the winter we'll have about four hours - suns up at 10 a.m. on the horizon and then down at 2 p.m.
Well, that's catch-up for now. Let us know how your doing. Post your replies and we'll keep this as current as possible.
~ Love you guys,
J&J and little G