Vacation

Just shortly after I left Joseph in Maryland, he was already wanting to plan a trip for me to come out again. We threw this idea around a bit to see if it was worth the expenses and time off from work. Our decision was that we NEEDED it. This baby is coming quickly and we both thought it was a great idea to have a little vacation together to celebrate. We didn't get a whole lot of time alone like I had been hoping for, but still a fabulous trip none the less.

So the first week of June I flew out to see my handsome hubby after 5 long weeks. My flight was actually quite nice. I handled it much better than the time before...didn't even have to use the barf bag! We stayed up much too late that night catching up and just simply enjoying the fact that we were together.

The next morning we made our way to Virginia. Joseph's Uncle Marley is living there and we got to visit with them for quite some time. They took us out for pizza and drove us around to see some sites.

Next on our stop was Mount Vernon. This was a beautiful place.



There was so much land! It was incredible.



We battled a terrible rain storm while standing in line to tour the house itself, but once we got through that the weather cleared up just enough to let us continue on through and see everything else as well.



The next day Joseph had to go back to work. Alyssa and I decided to take the train with him into DC and spend the day touring the city while he was busy working. We hit a little traffic on our drive to the train station which caused a little drama when getting there. Picture... pregnant woman, camera bag, flip flops, running to catch the train...wasn't pretty, but we made it. The first thing we did that morning was probably one of my favorite things the whole trip. We visited the Library of Congress. The building itself was stunning, but my favorite part was Thomas Jefferson's personal library. He had sold his collection of books to the Library of Congress after theirs was burnt.

After seeing his collection we then went to the overlook where you can look down into the library itself. Not everyone is allowed in there. You have to be staff or get a readers card to enter. Well...Joseph had his nifty little staff badge and he was able to get all three of us in. It was quite the experience.

Alyssa and I sent him on his way back to work and we jumped on a tour bus that took us all around the city. We spent the day hoping off and on seeing all kinds of museums and sites. Air and Space Museum, American History Museum (Thumbs up to: Julia Child's exhibit & First Ladies exhibit), Washington Monument, White House, Jefferson Monument, Lincoln Memorial, Holocaust Museum (another favorite), and others.



We had a full day of fun. Met Joseph just in time to catch the train and fill him in on all of our adventures.

The next day Joseph headed off for his last day of work while Alyssa and I stayed home, packed up the car and enjoyed brunch with Aunt Cynthia.

We then put our trust in Gary (our GPS) to get us to DC to meet Joseph. Thankfully we left in plenty of time because our little trip took twice as long as we had planned....darn you Gary! (It didn't have anything to do with the fact that I didn't put in the complete address). Not to mention the fact that traffic is horrendous and there are ONLY one way streets! You miss your turn and it's going to take you thirty minutes to get back to it. I think it only took us three tries to get to the parking garage. Did I mention that my husband is waiting for us to join him for our scheduled tour of the capital building? Yes, he was. And as I'm sure you can imagine, he was calling off the hook and making me even more stressed out then we already were. After some nice maneuvering and more running. We made it just in time to meet them on the elevator. What was he worried about?

We then were able to do a tour of the Capital building. It was fantastic. The architecture is breathtaking. I was just in awe at the history of our country. The tour guides we had weren't the greatest, but thankfully Joseph was given a tour when he first got there from a guy he worked with. So he was able to share a lot of those stories and facts with us.

From there we hit the road to New York! We arrived at Joseph's brother's in Brooklyn just in time to order some delicious Thai food and see the kids before they went to bed. It's been over a year since I've seen them and they are all growing up. Especially little Henry. He has quite the personality and kept me laughing the entire time.

The three of us spent the next day figuring out the subway and places to eat. Eating was mainly what our days were based around. We spent the day at Rockefeller Center and Times Square.






We also hit up Le Pain Quotidien for lunch. Food was good, but desserts to die for. I know I already talked about the Belgian Waffle before, but it seriously was that good.



The next day it worked out perfectly that the kids just happened to have the day off of school so we all piled the subway and hit up central park. Then battle the line at the Shake Shack for some lunch. By the time Randy got off work he met us at the Natural History Museum to spend a few hours. That thing was huge! We didn't even come close to seeing all of it.

The next morning we got up early to begin the long trip back home. Tennessee was our first stop where we visited with the Smith's and they put us up for the night. It's always a delight to spend time with them. Wish it wasn't so rushed. Then we packed in two extremely long days of driving to make it back to Provo on Sunday night.

What a trip it was. A few carefree days of whatever we wanted.