Minnesota Night: February 28, 2019

The 2nd Annual Minnesota Night hosted by the Minnesota Parent's Club was held in the Arnold Hall Ballroom. We hosted around 300 guests (there are 88 MN Cadets and each was allowed 2 guests). Also invited were the International Cadets as well as Academy staff and permanent party. We are Minnesota Nice, after all. 

The event was held as a way to bring a little bit of Minnesota State Fair to the Cadets who miss the State Fair (held in August when the Cadets are back at USAFA), as well as bringing gifts from home. We purposely held the event in February because it’s winter and it was a bit warmer (upper 40's to lower 50's) in Colorado than in Minnesota.  There were 38 parents and family members who made the trip to Colorado Springs to help put on the event.

The MN Parents that made the trip

The set-up inside Arnold Hall

Deep frying in progress

We served up Minnesota’s favorite foods brought from home: Fresh Minnesota Walleye, tater tot hot-dish, State Fair cheese curds, Lefse with butter and sugar, honey-crisp apples (invented at the University of Minnesota) with caramel dip, wild rice soup, and Minnesota’s own famous Sweet Martha’s cookies.

Dave Ryan from “The Dave Ryan Show” KDWB in Minnesota traveled out as well to MC the event. Dave’s father used to work at USAFA and he grew up on base.

Jackie & Dave Ryan, and Jackie's USAFA Parent Mentor

Dave held a MN themed trivia contest, in order to distribute all the prizes

Jackie and I both went, and we got to see Cadet Maas. The freshmen are just days away from the rigors of Recognition (more on that next week), and he came straight from training, which was ruck-sacking and rifle drills. 

Cadet Maas, straight from training

My first opportunity to see Cadet Maas since January 3rd

Cadet Maas at one of the tables

Cadet Maas filling up his plates with food from "home"

The Minnesota cadets

After the event, Cadet Maas spent two extra hours sitting and chatting with us. Which was much appreciated by us. 

On Friday, Jackie and I toured some of the Academy grounds that we haven't spent much time at previously. 

We also were able to view the Noon Formation that occurs nearly each day (if too icy, there is no formation). First up is a 5 minute 20 second montage video, followed by a 11 minute 55 second 'raw' video of the Noon Formation.