Day 71

Day 66 of BCT

This morning was the battalion run. My DS kept his word and didn't make me run it. Instead I got to help get the weapons ready for turn in. Everyone put their weapons in the classroom. Me and another female not running helped to get breakfast from the DFAC and had the fun of down stacking 2 pallets of bagged ice into the coolers. We then helped spot-check weapons and carried them over to the CQ. A lot of the weapons we checked weren't very clean, so everyone was pretty nervous about whether or not they would be accepted. We were finishing up as the rest of the company came running back. Everyone said the run was pretty easy, just long. We then had a Hot-A breakfast and gathered up the items we wanted to DX (exchange). I was going to exchange 2 sets of ACUs that had stains and try to get smaller pants. I also needed smaller PT pants. We put everything in our duffel bags and formed up to head to Hilton Field for graduation practice. We marched the two miles to the field. I was a road guard and I had troubles keeping up. Seems like our DS was in a hurry!
Practice wasn't too bad, it just seemed to take forever. We went through the whole ceremony 3 times. We then went back into the woods to practice for the Family Day Ceremony. We will all come running out of the woods. It's a much shorter ceremony (yay!) and we only had to run through it twice. It definitely had us all ready for tomorrow to get here!
After practice we ate our Jimmy Dean lunches they had given us that morning while we waited on the buses. We had to scarf it down as the buses pulled up shorty after we started eating. The buses took us back over to the 120th Reception (where our time at Ft. Jackson all began) and we were able to exchange out uniforms and boots. It took several hours to get everyone through.
Once we returned to the company they gave us time to start packing as well as work more on bay maintenance. We had chow at the DFAC and once we got back we got mail (3 more letters for me!) and our phones! Hooray!! We also got our personal bags so we could finish packing.
Our female DS had a few of us females help her finish putting together our packets. It didn't take very long. Our male DS came in the CQ while we were in there and he stopped to tell us he was proud of us. He looked at me and said he was especially proud of me and that I had better make it through OCS or he would come after me! It felt pretty good to hear my DS say he was proud of me. :-)
We got some personal time before Hydration Formation and of course everyone was on their phones! It was cool. We got photos and music.
Then bedtime! Tomorrow we see our families!!