By Emily Williams
Lieutenants Jenny and Will Hyden “aim high,” not only in their professional lives as members of the United States Air Force, but in their love lives as well.
Though both hail from the Birmingham area – Jenny from Mountain Brook and Will from Pelham – the two did not meet until their sophomore year of college through their Air Force ROTC program.
“I was at Samford and he went to UAB but we did ROTC through the detachment at Samford University, which is where we met,” Jenny said.
Because they were cadets in the same detachment, the two got to know each other through their classes and friends and eventually began dating.
One of Jenny’s favorite memories from their time spent dating was their “moon date.” The two created a bucket list of sorts – appropriately called the to-do list – that included the task of standing on the moon and looking at Earth.
One night, Jenny said she left a detachment meeting and found a package in her apartment.
“I opened it and there was a ‘letter from NASA’ with a flight suit and a time hack,” Jenny Hyden said. “Long story short, Will showed up in his flight suit and whisked me away to the ‘moon.’”
The makeshift moon landing consisted of a blanket spread in an empty lot and one phone displaying a Google Earth image of the world.
“It was pretty creative, he comes up with cool spoils like that every now and again and I love them,” Jenny said.
After four years of friendship and a year and half of dating, Will began planning his proposal, asking Jenny’s siblings for their blessings in September 2013. He then asked Jenny’s mother, Terry McBride, for her permission on Oct. 22. Will traveled all the way to Austin, Texas to suprise his future mother-in-law at her birthday lunch.
Before he proposed, Will said, his family also knew about the planned proposal, as did his two best friends.
“I told some of her closest friends the day of, when I knew they couldn’t accidentally let it slip,” Will said.
Though Jenny was kept in the dark, she said she was not blind to the imminent proposal.
“I had made it a practice to suspect a proposal at every turn,” she said. “Even if we weren’t together I was expecting him to show up randomly at work or at my friend’s house when I was on a trip and propose.”
On Dec. 27, 2013, the couple became engaged while also marking another experience off of their “to-do list” by climbing a water tower.
“It’s more difficult than you would think to find a water tower that isn’t blocked off,” Jenny said. “We’d been trying for the better part of a year to find one.”
Blinded by the excitement of finally finding a climbable tower, Jenny said she was not the least bit suspicious as Will handed her the to-do list, so she could cross off the item.
“I turned around to use the water tower as my writing surface and went to cross it off when I saw, ‘Climb to the top of a water tower,’ followed by, ‘Say yes to the rest of our lives together,’ “ Jenny said.
After she accepted the proposal, the couple began planning a wedding that Will said was the best party of his life. The two married on Nov. 22, 2014, at St. Paul’s Cathedral in Birmingham in a ceremony officiated by the Rev. Bob Sullivan from St. Francis Xavier Catholic Church.
Jenny stood at the altar with seven bridesmaids, including her sisters Kelli and Laura McBride serving as maids of honor, while Will stood with six groomsmen, his friends Jake Leurck and Luke Webb serving as best men.
“My mom, Will’s parents and my two sets of grandparents were all a part of our ceremony,” said Jenny. “It was so wonderful to have so much of our family present and part of our ceremony.”
In honor of her late father, Robert R. McBride Jr., Jenny and her family prayed a decade of the rosary before the ceremony and Terry McBride – per Jenny’s request – had her late husband’s signature stitched into the lining of the wedding dress.
Both agreed that their favorite part of the ceremony was just before Jenny was led down the aisle by her brother, Charlie McBride. The couple’s friend Debbie Flax sang an a cappella rendition of “Ave Maria” to signal the beginning of the procession.
Though there is a certain amount of protocol to follow in regard to military uniform, customs and decorum, Jenny said the event was not restrained by her and her husband’s involvement with the military.
“The fact that we had a saber arch was a little detail that set us apart from non-military weddings,” Jenny said.
The Arch of Sabers ceremony takes place as the newlywed bride and groom exit the wedding ceremony venue. A group of four, six or eight officers in uniform form an arch with their sabers and welcome the bride to the military as the couple passes underneath.
“It was cool to see our military friends and family dressed in uniform,” Jenny said. “It brought a sense of history and pride together in one place and reminded us to be grateful for the ones who were unable to make it because of that commitment to service.”
Following the ceremony, guests traveled across town to the McBride’s home for a backyard reception by the pool.
The couple said that the real showstopper at the wedding reception was the dance floor, which was packed for almost the entire evening.
Will said that his favorite moment at the reception was, “the dance-off between the guys and the girls. We had an epic dance off and the men clearly won – in spite of the rigged voting.”
The Pat Patrick Band from Nashville provided live music for the reception.
“That dance floor was out of control in the best way possible,” Jenny said. “I loved it when me, Will and The Fab Five – my family – got up on the stage with the band and sang the last part of Aretha Franklin’s ‘Respect.’”
After sharing a final slow dance, the Hydens exited the reception through a path of fireworks and headed to the Excellence Resort in Playa Mujeres, Mexico, for a week-long honeymoon.
“It was awesome not to have a care in the world,” Jenny said. “All-inclusive resorts are the way to go for your honeymoon. We hadn’t had that much time devoted to just us before.”
The couple said that they relished their time together, as their first married year would be spent apart. Due to their military obligations, Jenny has been residing in South Carolina while Will is stationed in Florida. Living apart for the first year of marriage exemplifies their devotion to the second core value of the United States Air Force: Service Before Self.
“It’s been a honeymoon every time we get to see each other,” Jenny said.
Their lives apart will come to a close very soon as Jenny will be able to move to Florida in October, which she said is the first step in their big plans for their lives together.
“We want to get our own plane one day and give people joy rides, have a bunch of kids …” Jenny said. Will interrupted to correct her and said that they would be having three kids.
In addition, Jenny said that they hope to make an adventure out of every assignment they get from the military.
Jenny said, “We’ll duck, dive, dip and dodge with whatever life throws our way.”
