Weekend Recap, Vol. 11

Hi, friends! With the past two weeks being a bit crazy at work, I haven’t had the chance to catch you up on my weekend adventures lately. So today, I’d like to share our activities from a couple weekends back. They include rocket launches and hockey games, so get excited! 😀

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A couple Fridays back, I had the unique opportunity to volunteer at a local elementary school to teach kids about rockets. Working with kids while sharing my passion of space is one of the things that brings me the most joy in life. And while I was exceedingly active at Texas A&M (I even redesigned the Aerospace Engineering curriculum for freshman), I haven’t had as many opportunities since moving to Colorado. And that really has nothing to do with Colorado and everything to do with the fact that I’m new and still learning the ins and outs of my school and job. At any rate, I jumped (literally) at the opportunity to volunteer with kids a couple weeks back.

Friday morning, myself and two other Aerospace Engineering students from CU drove out to a little school in Brighton. We spent the first part of the day talking all about rockets and what makes rockets fly (Newton’s laws). It was really fun seeing the kids light up when we talked about the space shuttle and astronauts, and I loved seeing  their hands shoot up when they knew an answer to one of our questions. It’s that kind of excitement and energy that makes working with kids one of the best things ever.

Next, we spent a large portion of the day building rockets. Each student got their own rocket, with no two being alike. It was fun to hear their theories on which rockets would launch higher or fly straighter and why. And that’s the fun part of science, right?! Predicting an outcome and then testing it for yourself. Science isn’t about always being right. It’s about finding the truth through trial and error. Being wrong is just a part of the process.

Think about our world view today. We used to think the Earth was flat and that the Sun orbited the Earth. It wasn’t until Copernicus questioned what was widely-believed as ‘truth’ that he found an even greater truth founded in science–that the Earth orbits the Sun. And it wasn’t an easy process either. It took years and years of trial and error before the currently accepted model of elliptical orbits was found. For the longest time, Copernicus believed the orbits had to be circular. It was the simplest solution, right? And while his initial prediction of circular orbits wasn’t entirely correct, it was his process of trying new shapes and evolving his ideas that eventually led him to the idea of elliptical orbits (a circle is a specific type of ellipse). <– A fun little historical aside.

But I digress. #nerd

During our rocket building, we even had a surprise visit from a very special space traveler–Astornaut Joe Tanner (in the center of the picture below)!! The kids loved asking him all kinds of questions about space and they even got special mission patches from his time on the ISS. The three of us graduate students were really jealous…

P.S. – Anyone think “Astronaut Mike Dexter” when you read Astronaut Joe Tanner. Haha. Oh Tina Fey.

After finishing up the rockets, we headed out to the playground for a bonafide rocket launch. And it couldn’t have been a more perfect day. There wasn’t a cloud in the sky nor a breeze to be felt.

Some flew perfectly! …Others not so much. But one thing’s for sure… All rockets flew spectacularly in one way or another! 😉

The kids really loved getting to hit the ‘go’ button for launch. And everyone else in the crowd would give a countdown 5-4-3-2-1 each go-around. So much fun!

Overall, I think the kids (and all us grad students) had such a blast! (<– pun intended) and I already can’t wait to go volunteer again soon. We’re actually thinking about starting up a local rocket launching program for elementary kids in the area. So if you know of any schools or kids programs that would be interested in such a resource, let me know!

After we got back into town, I took a good long nap (because kids can really wear you out!). Later that evening, Allen, Conor and I went out on a little dinner date to BJ’s Brewhouse and then on to a late movie. Allen and I went to see Deadpool on Valentine’s Day, but we really wanted to watch it with Conor, so round #2 was in order. And it did not disappoint.

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Saturday we took it easy (per the usual lately). I worked a bit on homework and quite a bit on the blog. Weekends are quickly becoming the primary time I have for the blog, so taking advantage of my time on the weekends (when really all I want to do is relax and unwind) has been a major goal of mine. But don’t worry too much…Allen and I make sure to not work too hard over the weekend, and we always make time for having some serious fun.

Coming from Alaska and being a huge hockey fan, Allen has been dying to get to an Alaska Aces game. And with the Colorado Eagles being right in Loveland (~45 min drive from Boulder), we knew we’d have the chance to see them play at some point. It just so happened that when Allen checked the hockey schedule for Saturday evening, the Aces were playing in Colorado! How convenient, right?! So later that evening we set out on an impromtu date night at the hockey rink in Loveland.

The sky was absolutely stunning on our drive out there. Sometimes the best thing on a road trip is the wide open spaces. Nothing but your thoughts, beautiful skies, and a good tune or two to keep you company.

Our seats may have not been the best, but at $16 a ticket I wasn’t complaining one bit!

Allen has his own Aces jersey and he let me borrow one of his Aces shirts for the game. I’m pretty sure it was his way of making sure I didn’t wear the other team’s colors by accident. 😛

The game was so much fun and it made me miss all the date nights we’d have in College Station, watching the Texas A&M hockey team play on Fridays. And with the drive being under an hour, I see many more games in our future.

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Sunday morning I woke up bright and early for a photo shoot with Cheyenne in Lone Tree, CO. Afterwards we found a local Snooze Eatery for breakfast. The wait was still ridiculously long (even being in a smaller town), but the food was definitely worth it. It’s always worth it. Haha.

As it would be, this particular breakfast would get off to a rougher start than normal. A few minutes after we had been seated (in a speed dating type seating situation, read: very close to other couples), the girl next to me had a seizure. At first, no one understood what was happening. But we soon realized after a few moments that her convulsions were of a very serious nature. We quickly pushed all the tables away from her (to keep her from hurting herself) and laid her on her side, beside me on the bench. And then we waited. We waited for her episode to finish because there was really nothing else we could do. I just remember feeling so helpless and so scared for her. Nothing like this had ever happened to me before and I felt at a loss of what to do next. So I kept brushing her hair out of her face. It seems so silly now, but I just couldn’t do nothing as I sat beside her.

Once her seizure had ended, she wasn’t responsive for a very long time. I’ll never forget the emptiness I saw in her eyes. It was haunting and I was terrified that I had just witnessed someone dying. We weren’t even sure if she was breathing. Luckily, with the ambulance on its way, she slowly began to regain consciousness and we did everything we could to comfort her as she came back to until the paramedics arrived and took over.

I tell you this story not to scare you or even to get your sympathy, but instead to share with you an experience I had that reminded me of the fragility of life. Thinking back on the experience, it was very eye-opening for me (and Allen as well). It reminded us that life is precious and you should never take it for granted, no matter how young or healthy you may think you are. This girl was my age. My age! And she looked just as healthy as the next person.

It also made me rethink what role I wanted to have in these kinds of situations. I used to be a lifeguard over the summers in high school, but it’s been quite some time since I’ve been CPR certified. And while I knew to put her in the recovery position and to remove any objects which could hurt her while she was seizing, I felt as though I was utterly helpless when it came to assessing if something further needed to be done. (There was a point at the end of the seizure where we couldn’t see or feel her breathing. Yikes!) Needless to say, I think I’ll be re-certifying in CPR very soon and brushing up on my knowledge of how to address medical emergencies when/if they arise. Don’t get me wrong, I’m under no illusion that I’m a medical professional, but I do want to be as prepared as a I possibly can be if something like this is to happen again.

At any rate, after a good 15 minutes of gathering ourselves and our thoughts, Allen and I decided to go ahead and stay for breakfast. I had lost a large portion of my appetite, but I thought the food would do us some good after the shock of the morning’s events.

Allen went with a solid choice of chocolate chip pancakes (#kidatheart), while I went with the hash brown scramble (aka starch-lovers special).

After breakfast, we made the drive back to Boulder and relaxed the rest of the day–rejuvenating ourselves and regathering our thoughts for the rest of the week.

Overall, it was an eventful weekend–any way you look at it. And while some moments of this weekend were more fun than others, all the moments in our life add up to making us who we are today, right? So I’m thankful for them all. I am grateful for the lessons we learned from such a scary situation. Cup half full. Never take life for granted, and live life to the fullest.

What about you? Did you do anything fun over the past couple weekends? I’d love to know!

In case you are interested, here is my last weekend recap. As always, feel free to leave comments below! If you’re interested in getting posts sent straight to your inbox, subscribe in the sidebar with your email. Or follow along on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter or Bloglovin’.