Second Christmas

We came home from Florida yesterday and now have a short vacation from our vacation. Our time with family was wonderful. We were able to see everyone in the family, including Zach who I haven't seen since his return from his mission. Today was great since we had the whole day off, rather than just the evening. Leigh was in charge, but since it was a Thursday she forgot that we had the whole day and just planned the evening. This actually turned out to be perfect because then we were able to sleep in (until 7:30 which is late for us) and play a game of tennis in the cold.

We came home and ate breakfast and then had our second Christmas! Since we traveled to Florida, we are both only take a few presents to actually give to each other and then take pictures of some other gifts that we can open when we get home. One of those gifts that Leigh bought for me was tickets to see South Pacific at the Kennedy Center!

So in the afternoon we drove down to DC since the metro is awful on weekends. We parked next to the National Academy of Sciences, which has a famous statue of Albert Einstein out front sculpted by Andrew Berk. Dinner was at a place called Farmers and Fishers on the Georgetown waterfront. The duck was amazing. I didn't know you could order it medium rare, medium well, etc. I've only had roast Peking duck before. We then walked over to the Kennedy Center to see the show. In front of the opera house, there is a bust of JFK by the same artist, Andrew Berk. Overall, the show was pretty good. Leigh kept singing "I'm going to wash that man right out of my hair" even though she said she wasn't mad at me :) Hats off to Leigh for a wonderful 30th!

Christmas Lights?

This date was a short one since it fell on a work day. I got off at 4:30 and came home. We ate a simple and quick dinner at home and then went to see some Christmas lights since the holiday season has officially begun. The Festival of Lights at the Washington DC temple is supposed to be one of the best displays in the area, but we planned on seeing that later in the month, before one of the performances at the Visitors' Center. So we decided to go to Brookside Gardens down the road from our house. It was rainy and cold and we showed up and they wanted $20 to get in! The Festival of Lights is free! We didn't have any better ideas, so we just ante'd up and pulled out our umbrella. It wasn't much compared to Disney World or many other light displays, but they tried. Unfortunately we think they got the Halloween decorations mixed up with the Christmas decorations because they had spiders and spiderweb lights. If you live in the DC area, it's probably not worth your time.

Afterwards, we went to a friends house to celebrate a birthday. We were able to talk and eat birthday cake and relax. Sometimes it's hard to get out and see friends, but it's worth it once you're there. The last two dates have been somewhat short and simple (and Leigh thinks boring). December 30th we both have the day off and Leigh has something planned, so I'm excited.

Rally? What Rally?

We thought it would be fun to go to the Rally to Restore Sanity put on by Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert on this 30th, which was nice because it actually fell on a Saturday. We slept in a little bit (until 7:30) and then played tennis since we haven't had a whole lot of time to do that together. Then we headed down to DC for the rally, starting at the White Flint metro station. There were hundreds of people on the platform waiting when we got there. We rushed into one of the cars and were able to find a seat. After the next stop, people were crammed into capacity. At each subsequent stop, nobody was able to squeeze on. And there were tons of people at each stop. The rally started at 12 and so we thought that would be a good time to get there. I think the permit requested for the rally only predicted about 60,000 people. But we showed up and there were throngs of people. We tried to get close, but once we were touching people on all four sides and couldn't move and couldn't hear anything from the rally, we got a little claustrophobic and turned around. I knew I didn't like crowds, but I gained an added measure of determination to never try to fight that kind of crowd again. I like personal space and being relaxed, not trying to squeeze through people just to get 5 feet closer.

Next, we decided to go to a museum since they were likely empty. We decided to go to the National Portait Gallery and see the 3rd floor. We like to be thorough, so we bite off small chunks at a time. In the second picture below there was a horse made out of driftwood, but in order to enable it be sturdy and able to be moved, the artist cast each piece in bronze and then proceed to brush each piece to look like sun-bleached driftwood. After about an hour, we headed home. In hindsight, watching the rally on TV would have been much more enjoyable than those sweaty, crowded metro rides and all that wasted time. Oh well.

It was after all, Halloween weekend, so we went to a Halloween party with friends in the evening and got to eat some candy and have a good time. It ended up being a somewhat disjointed day, but every date can't turn out to be perfect and we still had fun!

All's Well That Ends Well

Chris's schedule for the current clerkship is 545am-6pm which means getting up around 430 or 5 am depending on the hospital. I tried to encourage him to have a quiet date night at the house. His response was that the purpose of our monthly date is to force us to get out of the house and experience life together. So we did just that!

Chris booked tickets for Shakespeare's All's Well That Ends Well, showing at 8pm August 30th. (A few weeks ago some friends had kindly invited us to see this years free for all, Shakespeare's Twelfth Night. We so enjoyed our time that we decided to go back.) After work, we had just enough time to spend about 15 minutes in the modern section of the Photo museum before heading to dinner at Ruby Tuesday. Amazingly it was the first time that Chris and I ordered the same entree. Not surprisingly though, I still ended up eating off his plate - his sides were better! :) The play was good, not great, but we left more cultured I suppose. Sadly, no pictures. I really wanted a picture of us under our Two-man umbrella in the rain but it was nearly midnight and Chris was unwilling to wait for someone to take our picture. It was nearly midnight and 4:45 in the morning was approaching quickly. I must say- I am so glad Chris insisted that we get out- we really had a great time despite the lack of sleep it imposed on us the following day.

A Little Bit of Italy

Today I just had a half-day so Leigh was able to meet me downtown. We went to an exhibit at the National Geographic Museum on Leonardo Da Vinci. One of his quotes we liked was, "There are those who see, those who see when shown, and those who do not see." I think we both fall into one of the last two categories. We have to get explanations for a lot of things to make sense. At the exhibit, they had reconstructions of some of his designs/inventions for everything from a human whirligig to clocks to primitive scuba gear. All of the models were replicas from his designs so a lot of them we could touch and use. Since we saw an exhibit about an Italian, we decided to go home and have some spaghetti and celebrate the things we love about Italy. Unfortunately we didn't have gelato. I think if we were to ever get stationed in Italy Leigh would live off of pizza and gelato which is so opposite of what pleases her palate here in America.


Going back in time, we did try to make up for the half day by spending last Friday in DC. We went to Woodrow Wilison's house and Tudor's Place. Leigh has decided we should live in a replica of Tudor's place. Three acres of land right in the middle of a metropolitan area. I really don't know how to respond to that request. We are all allowed to dream I suppose.

Dinner and a Concert

Fortunately, the 30th this month turned out to be a post-call day for me so I got off at 11:30 AM. I came home and took a short nap, then we headed off to Baltimore. The main reason for visiting Baltimore is because of a restaurant named Roy's that Leigh had not been to for a while. It's a chain restaurant with a Hawaiian fusion theme with lots of good fish. Anywhere with good fish makes Leigh happy. Since we had the afternoon off, we went to the Visionary Art Museum (my wife is so good at finding ways to get into museums for free). Then we walked along the Inner Harbor to Roy's. It's a very pretty place but occasionally smells a little funny. At Roy's, the shrimp was ok, the Mahi mahi was good, and the edamame was amazing. Afterward, we went to a concert at Merriweather Post Pavilion featuring Jason Aldean. We love country, but that was about as country as you can get. I think 90% of the vehicles were huge trucks and everybody had on boots, jeans, no shirts, cowboy hat and beer in hand. I was impressed that I lasted until the last song when someone inevitably spilled beer all over my shoes. Despite being a bit hickish, (is that a word?) we had lots of fun and enjoyed the music. It was our first time going to a concert together in probably over a year. Honestly, eating good fish and going to a good concert are two things that Leigh loves to do and does a lot less of since she's married me and moved up to DC. She says I should fix that.....anyone know any good cheap music coming to town?? :)

A month of 30th's

Our last month has been a celebration every day. This is something that Chris tells me I must remember for the last two years of medical school.

Chris took his first night call of medical school last night. Neither of us are thrilled by this night call thing, but I suppose it's inevitable. So he got off at 12noon today which could have been very exciting it being a 30th and all. He walked in the door and went straight to bed. My immediate thought was "sad day!" However, we ended up having a wonderful time.......

In the evening we spent time looking back over the year and documenting how much fun we've had. Chris spent time updating the blog (sorry- we were having too much fun to keep it up I guess!) and I started scrapbooking our last year. Monday of this week ended our month-long vacation. After traveling to Germany for 4 days, we went to Venice to start our cruise to the Greek Isles, which lasted 7 days. We had a fantastic time! Things we saw included; Krka National Park in Croatia, and historical palaces, ruins, ancient art, cozy villages and famous beaches in Greece. During this time, Chris came up for a nickname for me: Zoom (b/c I like to walk fast). Unfortunately, cruises don't give you enough time in port so Chris had to pick up his walking speed for a while. Poor guy! :) Anyways, after the cruise we spent a few days in Venice. This was a fun, informative, architecturally beautiful place but we learned one thing- it's not very romantic. Not for us anyway - way too crowded. Romantic for us is typically secluded. We have unknowingly continued a tradition every year for our anniversary. For our honeymoon in 2008 we were in Alaska and I made glass blown ornament. Last year, Chris paid for a class on how to make art using warm glass. For this month of 30th's we spent time in Murano - the glass blowing capital of the world as far as I know - as this is something I have always wanted to do, I was super excited about this. So lucky us, on June 30th our art pieces we purchased in Murano arrived and we actually found a place for it in our small apartment! Isn't it pretty??? Overall, we had a wonderful day.On a side note - The only thing that would have made our Europe trip better was if friends could have joined us. So next time we travel we expect you to join!!!! And for more pictures, eventually Chris will put them up on Facebook.

We're Two!

We made it to the toddler years of marriage! Whoever said that the first few years of marriage are the hardest I think had it wrong. The first year goes by to fast and the second, well, we have had a great deal of fun this past year. The fact that this year our anniversary fell on a Sunday made us really think about our marriage covenants. That part was quite wonderful because I do have a testimony that I will be with Chris for eternity and I am so looking forward to that. (Most days anyway) So between starting our day with the sacrament and ending it with scripture reading, we had a very relaxing yet busy day. We had fun staying at home, relaxing in our robes. Chris made me a wonderful gourmet meal that I loved. Amazingly, we both agreed that our roasted cauliflower au gratin would have to become a regular. We packed for our trip to Europe (we left the next day!) and that resulted in clothes being thrown every which way. A fun way to pack for sure! Sometime during the day we watched "Momma Mia" to prepare us for our time in Greece.

Capitals Hockey Game

The hockey season is coming to an end and I was going to be so sad if we let another season go by without seeing a single game. Hockey has always been my all time favorite sport to see live. I lost the connections to great seats in FL once I said yes. :) Thankfully, we have some wonderful friends who were able to sell us some tickets for the March 30th came. Yay! Chris, the wonderful man that he is, was able to sneak us a great dinner from Chopt into the game. The game was exciting despite the disappointing end. Who calls a dumb penalty with 31 sec of OT left?

Hershey for Valentine's

February is a good month not to have a 30th because then we do our monthly celebration on Valentine's Day. What things come to your mind when you think of Valentine's Day? Chocolate, flowers, dinner... well I decided to focus on chocolate this year, so we had a one night getaway up to Hershey, PA. It was supposed to be a surprise, but somehow Leigh always has a clue either because she saw something she wasn't supposed to or I accidentally slip beforehand. We went up on Friday and checked in to the Hershey Hotel and they had chocolate bars for us as we checked in. Then they had this super rich hot chocolate in the lobby - almost too rich to really enjoy it. We went to dinner on the grounds at the Harvest, a restaurant that strives to get all of their ingredients within a 100 mile radius. Afterwards we went to the Chocolate Spa to get the "Sweet Feet for Two," a pedicure with chocolate somehow involved. Basically they just put some chocolate paste on your feet in the middle to moisturize, but other than that it was a pretty standard pedicure. Then we went to a chocolate sampler buffet in the Fountain Lobby of the hotel and tried all sorts of chocolate desserts. Leigh's favorite part was the strawberries and the chocolate fountain. In the morning we enjoyed swimming in the indoor pool and the hot tub. Leigh went to the Spa again for a "Whipped Cocoa Bath," something I had to get for her because it was one of their signature treatments. Don't think hot chocolate, it turned out to be a jacuzzi but instead of bath salts or something, they put in this cocoa powder. I liked the spa experience a lot, it's just one that I can't afford all too often. Once we checked out we went and saw some standard Hershey attractions, like Chocolate World and the Hershey Story Museum. At Chocolate World I got selected to do a taste test for Hershey's new raspberry hug, which was ok. From the chocolate and the museum, we realized (we kind of already knew), that Hershey's isn't world-class chocolate but it's claim to fame is being the first mass-produced chocolate that made it affordable to most people. Before Hershey, it was only a delicacy of the rich. So I am grateful for Milton Hershey's ingenuity. Yet we couldn't help but thing maybe he got the ball rolling on this whole obesity epidemic in America... (his first chocolate bar wrapper advertised it as a nutritious snack)

White House

Several months ago Leigh and I decided to set up a White House tour. We were hoping we could find enough people to commit to go with us (10 is required to set up a reservation) and we got more than expected! You submit the request months ahead of time, and then are given 2-3 weeks notice of your scheduled time. It just happened to fall on the 30th. After the White House tour, the plan was pizza at Matchbox and then an afternoon at one of the Smithsonian museums. We thought it was a great idea for a 30th celebration! The weather did not cooperate and it was snowing the entire time we were down in DC. I woke up grumpy (stress?), the weather was cold, lunch was confusing (getting everyone from the White House to the restaurant in the snow) and the museum was somewhat boring. I had also hoped maybe the snow would make for pretty pictures of the capitol; however, snow was still coming down hard so you could hardly see 50 feet in front of you. Leigh and I went home, relaxed, made a really bad dinner (recipe sounded good but it was fairly awful) and then dreamed about last month's 30th. Oh to be back there in the warmth..... you cant win them all!