Virginia is for Book Lovers!

I love Fairfax County Libraries! Let me tell you why. I went to the library in a city I do not live in with two pieces of mail addressed to me and they gave me a library card free of charge. The card works in all of the libraries in the county and you can return the books to any of the libraries regardless of where you checked the book out from. It is awesome!

Maybe for most people this is normal, but for me who just recently came from Utah, I was in heaven! In Utah County, if you do not have a library in your town, then you have to pay $60 or more a year to get a card. And you can only use the card at that one library where you got it from. Some of the libraries are not all that big and so you are very limited in your choice of books and you can not go to another to see if they have what you want unless you want to pay another $60+ to get another card.

I'm pretty sure after I got my library card here I called up my parents and almost all of my siblings to share the exciting news! Seriously I love it!

Visitin' the Presidents!

I had the day off today and it was a gorgeous day! I decided I wanted to do something downtown D.C. I decided to go to the FDR Memorial and walk around the Tidal Basin. Of course if one walks around the Tidal Basin one must stop at the Jefferson Memorial.

First I went to the Jefferson Memorial. I really like it! I think it's a fitting tribute to a great president! It was so peaceful there. After I stopped there for a while, I made my way over to the FDR Memorial. I also really liked that too. It was very unique and beautiful! I loved all of the waterfalls there. I'm sure there is some significance to them although I do not know what (or maybe they're just there for beautifulness. I do not know.) It was a gorgeous day and a perfect day to be outside.

As I walked around the Tidal Basin, I enjoyed the beautiful red, yellow and orange leaves on the trees. I watched the reflection of the Washington Monument on the water change as I walked around. I oohed and ahhed over the way the sun was shining through the clouds. Did I mention it was a gorgeous day?!

After I finished walking around the Basin, I went towards the Washington Monument. I wanted to go to the top of the monument but alas the tickets were sold out for the day and oh yeah did I mention that my battery in my camera died? I took one picture with my camera and it died. It was sad, but of course I still enjoyed the lovely day!

I made my way over to the National Portrait Gallery on foot where I met my friend, Elizabeth. We met up and went inside the huge museum and looked around a bit and then decided to wander outside. We saw a beautiful, bright rainbow over the capital building as we were walking. It was magnificent! Then we went to the top of the Old Post Office Tower. The sun was starting to set behind the Washington Monument and the clouds were really cool!

At this point, Matt called me and asked if I wanted to meet up with him and Lincoln and go to Spence's football game. So Elizabeth and I hopped on the metro home and parted ways then I met up with Matt and went to Spence's football game. They lost. But Lincoln is really cute :)

I Rock!

In September, I canned for the first time ever all by myself. On Labor Day, Lara, Glen, Spence, Cami, Emma, Adam, Ellie and I went raspberry picking and picked about 5 lbs. We knew we wouldn't be able to eat them all before they went bad, so I planned on making raspberry jam out of them. I had never done this, but with the directions in the pectin package and maybe a few clarifications from Lara, I did it all by myself. It made the three jars above plus part of another one. The jam was pretty good, if I do say so myself :) I think we've eaten them all now except a little bit of one of them. I ROCK!!!

Shenandoah National Park!

Yesterday was a beautiful sunny day! The leaves are in their prime of changing colors and we had nothing going on after church, so we decided to take a little trip to Shenandoah National Park. Lara, Glen, Spencer, Cami, Emma, Adam, Ellie and I started off on our journey to the park.
It took about an hour to get to the town where the park is but then it took us about a half an hour to actually get into the park because everyone else seemed to have the same idea. It was really busy. We finally got into the park and found a lovely spot to park and walk around. Here are some of the photos from my camera from yesterday.

This was towards the end of the trip and we were all getting a little silly.

I really like this picture of Spence and I. I think it's funny:)

Right after the sun went behind the mountain/hill! We watched the sunset and it was gorgeous!

Right before sunset.

Emma and I on the trail we walked on for awhile. I really like this picture of us.

Self-portrait!

I like the angle of this shot. The colors were beautiful! The weather was sunny and cool!

Look at the beautiful background!

I like this picture of my reflection in Spence's awesome sunglasses:)

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME!

Well I'm really tired. But I really wanted to post on my birthday. I'm not going to say much besides that today was a pretty good day and that pictures and more details will come later.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME!

Georgetown Cupcake!

The continuation...
I made it to the metro and headed downtown to meet my friend, Jennifer. I was early and so I got off a couple stops earlier and found a McDonald's to eat at since I hadn't eaten lunch yet. The restaurant was huge and there was a sign that said only McDonald's customers could be in there and that they could be in there no longer than 30 minutes. (My guess is that they have a problem with homeless people coming in and staying there all day). Then I decided I should go to the bathroom before I left and I ended up not going because there was a sign that said you had to have a token to get into the bathroom and that vandalism was forbidden and someone was in there and I didn't feel like waiting. (I'm a little impatient sometimes.)

I wandered over to the metro and found a little farmer's market, which I would like to wander through some time when I have more time. Then I hopped back on the metro and got off at the stop to meet my friend Jennifer, but I was still early so I wandered some more. By this time I really had to go to the bathroom but I had no idea where to go.

I found a tiny 7-11 and asked if I could use their bathroom. Thankfully they let me, although it was not a public bathroom. I had to walk down this steep little staircase into a windowless little basement while waiting for a guy to come out of the bathroom. I think I really surprised the guy because he jumped a little when he walked out and I was right there. I told him why I was there and he said that was fine. When I came out out of the bathroom, the guy that had come out before me was praying on a rug on the floor (it was about the time of day for prayer call).

After I left the 7-11 it was time to meet my friend. We had been planning this for a couple of days and so I was excited to meet up and go to our destination. We walked from George Washington University to Georgetown Cupcake. Georgetown Cupcake is a famous cupcake shop because of it's deliciously awesome cupcakes and the many different flavors they have. Jennifer had ordered ahead of time and so we just walked in and paid and found a table outside to eat some of the delicious cupcakes! I had a pumpkin, spice cupcake and it was really good! I was definitely not disappointed by the cupcakes that I had heard so much about:) We had bought some extra cupcakes and I brought some home for Lara and Glen to try.

After we ate the cupcakes we walked across the Key Bridge and went to Theodore Roosevelt Island. We saw the memorial to President Roosevelt. I really liked it, although Jennifer said she thought it was a little creepy. I think it was the time of day that we were there. (It was starting to get dark). Then we made our way to the metro and headed home.

Overall it was a really good day! Adventurous I must say, but really good!

Driving a Bus Through an Army Base

Today I had off of work and so I wanted to do something fun! Last night I decided I would try to go to the temple by means of the metro and bus system. (For some reason it never dawned on me that there was a metro and/or bus close to the temple until Matt mentioned it the other day:) I figured out the most direct route to get there and set out on my adventure this morning.

First I hopped on the metro and went to the station, where the bus would be to take me to the temple. I got off the metro and onto the bus and thankfully the bus had this talking machine that told us every stop coming up, otherwise I definitely would not have exited at the right stop. We were driving on these narrow, windy, tree-lined streets where I could not see far enough ahead to see the street signs coming up. I got off at my stop and looked around to see if I could see which way to go. Although I knew I was close to the temple, I couldn't see the temple at all because there were so many trees.

It was in a residential area and so I walked up one of the streets to see if I could see anything and when that didn't help, I made a few calls to see if someone could look it up for me but eventually realized it was much easier to find someone outside that I could ask how to get to the Mormon temple. I found a man outside and he directed the way. As I started walking, it made me a bit nervous because there were no sidewalks and very little grass or anything to walk on beside the busy road. I made it to the right road and was happy to see the temple and the little bit of sidewalk that I got to walk on :)

I did a session (which was awesome) and then came back out and waited for the bus right in front of temple. (For some reason there was no bus directly to the temple at the time I was going, but on the way out there was). On the bus we went through an army annex base and a guard got on the bus and all of us had to show our ids aka driver's license to get through. When he first got on I didn't know what was going on, so I was a bit nervous, then he told me he needed to see my id. I stumbled through my purse looking for it and finally found it and showed it to him.

This bus was not equipped with the cool talking machine that told us each stop, so I was keeping my eyes out for the metro. We stopped at a stop for longer than normal and I could not see a metro sign but I decided to ask someone if this was the metro and indeed it was the stop I was looking for. I was glad that I asked.

TO BE CONTINUED....