Side trip to NYC (DC Trip Day 1!!)

So here it is...the long awaited Washington DC pictures! We had so much fun and saw so many things that it's impossible to put up all of our pictures and it would be ridiculous to try and get it all to fit into one post. So in order to try to make this easy for me to write and for you to enjoy, I will be breaking posts up into days and what we did each day. It is possible that soon I will even have to break the days up into parts because we crammed so much stuff in to one day. So bear with me since this could turn out to be a very long post...without further ado, here we go!

We left Seattle about 9 o'clock on the morning of September 11th, 2010. We flew first down to Albuquerque, changed planes and then left for Baltimore. We ended up landing just as the sun was setting and it was really pretty. We then took the train from the airport to Union Station in DC then took the monorail to Dupont Circle and then walked to our B&B (Akwaba Bed & Breakfast - They were absolutely amazing and I would highly recommend them if you travel to any 4 of their locations).

This is what it looked like when we came out of the tunnel up to the street level of Dupont Circle.









After we dropped our stuff off, we went to go eat and then head to bed because we had an early morning the next day (especially for us because it was 3 hours earlier than we were used to!)

We left early the next morning and got on the bus for New York at 8:00am (5:00am our time...Eek!)

Here we are...in Maryland!

And now New Jersey... 

And FINALLY New York (4+ hours later)

Welcome to NYC!!
We walked right up next to Macy's on 34th where they stop and do performances for the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade! And there were lots and lots of taxis!
Off We Go!!

Broadway! Someday I would like to go back and see the Lion King.

The 2010 ball they dropped on the New Year. 

 

 

                                                                          Standing in Central Park

 

Trump International Hotel and Tower (this was ridiculously tall)

So here's something weird that happened. As you can see in the pictures above, it just looks like a little cloud over but overall it's not bad. Still mostly clear, you could still see the tops of all the skyscrapers (which is saying a lot). So we get on the subway (which was totally fun and super fast!) at Central Park and when we come out just outside the 9/11 memorial it's raining and the clouds had dropped so you couldn't see very well. I couldn't believe it!

September 11th Memorial. The new tower going in will be really big.

 

 

 

 

 

 If you can believe it, the statue of liberty is out there in the center. It's the darker spot of fog :)

That's right...it's the Batmobile!

The NY Stock Exchange on Wall Street

At this point we were fairly wet but we decided that we would just walk around some more and find something to eat (we hadn't eaten anything since breakfast at 7:30 or so) because it was getting later into the evening. We ended up walking all the way up to SoHO and we were thoroughly soaked. We got on a subway from there and ended up back in Times Square. We ate at the Hard Rock Cafe (my first experience...pretty awesome to thing that the first time I ate at Hard Rock was in NYC Times Square) and then got back on the bus. We got back to the B&B really late, but it was totally worth it!

All in all, we saw quite a bit of stuff when we were in NY for only one day. I can't believe all the stuff that we saw and how much more we missed out on. Such a big city. Obviously we took hundreds of pictures but these are mostly the highlights of the trip. 

Stay tuned for days 2-10!

Elf Yourself!

It's back and it's better than ever!

The Big Trip

So Rich and I have planned a little trip for ourselves this year and decided that we were going to go to Washington DC! We figured that now would be the best time to do a trip like this since we don't have any kids and trips like this won't really be possible one they come bopping along. I've been so excited and busy planning all the things we can and get to do.

The first on the list is to arrive in Washington DC on Saturday night (September 11th) and go to bed! :) We have a tour of the Capital Building on Monday and then the following Tuesday we have a tour of the White House, just before we get back on a plane and head home (September 21st). I mapped out all of the attractions and figured it would be best to focus on the "Mall" since that's where most of the Smithsonian's are (which are all free!!!).

After some quick searching I found out that it's only a 4 hour bus ride to New York City. So I went ahead and booked some tickets for that too! I mean, when is the next time that we will be that close to an amazing place and be able to go there?!

I can't believe all the things we get to do...Museum of Natural History, Air and Space Museum, White House, Capital Building, National Archives Building, Library of Congress, Holocaust Museum, Union Station, Penn Station, Times Square, Ground Zero, Central Park, Statue of Liberty....And the list can go on and on and on! I am already expecting that we won't get to see everything that we want, but I hope that we get to see at least enough to make a memorable experience.

Well, I better get back to planning again. I need to make an "agenda" so that we have ideas for each day and we have a list of all the things we wanted to do!

It's only a week away!!! YIPPIE!!!!!

Photoshop Fun

So Rich showed me the other day that we have Photoshop on our computer! I still have no idea how to use anything but I did figure out how to make tilt-shift and fish-eye photos. (You can see examples of what a Tilt-Shift and a Fish-Eye lens do on cameras by clicking on each) With tilt-shift, you make ordinary pictures become like models of actual things. Here are some of the pictures I came up with!

This is a picture out the window from Adam's place. I think it looks like Mr. Rogers land of Make Believe :)

This is from Tim and Joann's house. It didn't turn out as well as the one from Adam's house , but it was still fun!

This was when Rich was up in Port Angeles, Washington.

I haven't really made any fish-eye pictures yet, but that is when your pictures look like they were taking looking through a fish's eye. 

So that's been my fun recently. Not much else is up. I'll be sure to update when something exciting comes up!

Moving Time!

At the end of April and the beginning of May, we moved into our new little home. It's so wonderful to have a little bit more room and finally have a garage, yard and garden!! Here is the process of going from the old apartment to the new little house!





Painting over the brown walls (how I miss my brown walls)...

...and Rich painting over my many mistakes

In the midst of all the packing I thought I would use up some of the ingredients in the fridge and came up with cheesecake!

  

Boxes going in to the new place!

The kitchen slowly coming together

The dining room and living room from the kitchen doorway

The "hallway" and bedroom from the living room

The extra bedroom and is much more cluttered now :)

Our little bedroom

Our house with the keys!!

Our little garden...

...Suddenly became a very large garden. It's even larger now and I'm eating tomatoes and blueberries daily!

You will have to wait for pictures of our current garden in a post yet to come!

So that is our new home in a nutshell. Hope you enjoyed to pictures as much as I enjoyed posting them (and figuring out how to get my blog working properly again!).

SORRY!!

Oh man, have I been so far behind. I apologize for not keeping up very well over the last few months. School became extremely time consuming and I let the blog slip away from me. But alas, I am back. I plan to update on what we've been up to the last few months and then keep this up to date. Bare with me, as this may take a while to get completely caught up! I have a feeling this will turn into a blog with more pictures than words, so I hope that is fine...

Silver Falls

So way back in April, we went on a little hike through Silver Falls, OR. It's a beautiful place and we were able to see a number of waterfalls along with some beautiful flora and fauna. Below are some pictures I took while hiking around.

First we will start with the Flora :)

I was going to move on to the fauna, but then I realized that we didn't see any animals...so here are just some pictures of the waterfalls and us instead!