Total Solar Eclipse!

This past weekend, I went to South Carolina to see the total solar eclipse on Monday, August 21! And it was one of the most amazing experiences I've ever had!!!

I made a weekend of it, but for now, I just want to talk about the day of the eclipse. (I'll write about the rest of the weekend in another blogpost.)

A friend from work, Heather, joined me on this adventure. We had talked about the night before where we wanted to see the eclipse and when we wanted to be there by. (Our hotel was not in the path of totality, so we had to drive about 50 miles to get into the path).

We woke up bright and early to give ourselves plenty of time to get to our chosen destination. Since we left before breakfast was available at our hotel, we looked up donut places in the city we were staying in. We found Sunny's Donuts just a couple of miles down the road and made that our breakfast that morning and can I just say how delicious my apple fritter was?! It was seriously so good! :)

Paris Mountain State Park just outside Greenville, South Carolina was our chosen place to watch the eclipse. We were worried about traffic getting into the path of totality as well as finding a good spot to watch the eclipse so we got there right when the park opened at 8. We got there and set up the blanket and chair that I had brought and then we had about 5 hours to kill.

Since we were in a state park, what else could we do but hike?! So hiking was what we did and it was awesome! It was beautiful! It was super hot and humid, but the scenery was amazing!

Lake Placid Trail. It was about a mile around and had pretty awesome scenery!

A dam at one end of Lake Placid! (When you see this picture of me, remember it was already hot and humid even though it was only about 8:30 in the morning.) ;)

Toward the end of the Lake Placid trail was a kind of rickety bridge and I decided I needed a picture of my feet on it. ;)

Mountain Creek Trail! There was an outdoor ampitheater along this trail and I thought it would be pretty cool to see a concert or something there.

Of course I had to get on stage and pretend I was performing. :)

I think this might be part of the Sulphur Springs trail but it might actually still be part of the Mountain Creek trail. I don't remember for sure. The Mountain Creek trail eventually turned into the Sulphur Springs trail. We hiked all of the Mountain Creek trail but not all of the Sulphur Springs one.

We hiked for about 3 hours and then we started walking back to the ballfield where we would watch the eclipse from and eat lunch and prepare for the eclipse to start. :)

Just seeing the partial eclipse was pretty dang cool. It was interesting to notice as the eclipse was getting closer and closer to totality, how the lighting changed around us (almost like a filter on my eyes or like I had sunglasses on when I didn't) as well as the temperature dropping. But it was also interesting to note how even when the eclipse got down to just a sliver or the diamond ring phase, how much light it still emitted.

Sometimes there were clouds that would come and cover the sun when it was still during partial and it would actually make it look really cool when we could still see the sun through the clouds. Even though the clouds made it look cool, we also worried a bit about the clouds being there during totality, but thankfully the sky was clear for that! :)

The total eclipse happened and it was amaaaazzzing! We could take off the eclipse glasses and look at the sun with our natural eyes without going blind. The moon (just for a moment) looked so big covering the sun except for the corona. The sky turned to dusk, I saw one star, the temperature dropped significantly.

People were cheering and clapping and I got goosebumps. I also had tears welling up in my eyes. I loved it all! It was so cool!

This picture was taken at 2:39 PM about a minute into totality!

We stayed at the park until the eclipse was officially over. It was pretty dang awesome!

On our way home, we hit traffic (which we were not surprised about). The gps took us on back roads for about 60 miles (because it was faster than getting on the freeway). I actually didn't mind seeing the countryside of South Carolina. It was beautiful!

Eventually we did have to get on the freeway, and it was really slow so we ended up stopping in Kannapolis, NC to sleep and let the traffic die down. We left early the next morning to drive the rest of the way home and thankfully had no problems with traffic.

The total eclipse is an experience I'll never forget! It was seriously so cool! If you ever get a chance to see a solar eclipse in totality, I highly recommend it. It was worth the time, money, traffic and heat and humidity to see it! :)

Shakespeare Theater!

Every year, my friend, Diana, organizes a group of her friends to carpool to Staunton, VA to see two shows at the Shakespeare theater located there. This year the two shows were Much Ado About Nothing and Loves Labours Lost.

Since I had seen Much Ado About Nothing on stage a few years ago, I decided to just go to Loves Labours Lost (the evening show).

I drove separately with my friend, Melinda. We stopped at the Shenandoah Heritage Market near Harrisonburg, VA on our way to Staunton. The market is fun to look around! It has different stores within the building. There is beautiful antique furniture, handmade Amish quilts and aprons and other such things, homemade jams, salsa, and syrups, kitchen items, antiques, fudge etc.  I may or may not have bought a few items there. :)

After the market, our next stop was the glass factory in Staunton. We were hoping to see some live glass blowing while there, but alas we were too late in the day for that. But we got to walk around and see all of the cool glass creations for sale. There were some pretty spectacular glass pieces!

After we were done with the glass factory, we found a used bookstore nearby and had fun browsing the books. Both of us probably bought something here. How could we not?! :)

Whenever Diana sets up this Staunton Saturday, we always have a picnic dinner at a park in Staunton in between shows. Melinda and I met them at the park and then it was time for the show.

I love this theater! I've gone to this gathering every year since I've moved here, so 7 times. It's awesome! The theater is small and cozy, the actors are amazing and talented, and the company is great!

Loves Labours Lost was entertaining. Sometimes I had a hard time understanding (basically Shakespeare in general is hard for me to understand sometimes), but overall I really liked it and laughed a lot!

Most of our group!

Thanks Diana for putting this together and thanks Melinda for carpooling with me!

Summer Happenings!

It's August already. How the heck did that happen?! Time seems to move so fast sometimes! Here are some happenings in my life this summer.

I called Lara up one Saturday morning to see if they were going on a hike that day. I was happy that they were and I joined them on their hike from Carderock to Great Falls and back (about 7 miles round trip). :) It was a beautiful day this day!

Back in 2010, I started making collages of the pictures I had from my semester at the BYU Jerusalem Center, but I didn't do anything with them. They just sat in my google photos and I never looked at them. That is until this summer when I finally decided to do something with the photos.

I used mixbook.com and put my already made collages plus a bunch of pictures I hadn't made into collages yet into a photobook. I am really pleased with the way the book turned out! It's good quality and I love having the book on the coffee table in my living room where I can look at it whenever I want (and I do look at it often). :)

I went to the County Fair at the beginning of the summer with two friends. What else do you do at a fair but eat lots of food?! :) I didn't know you could get different flavors of corn dogs but you can. I think this one was Wisconsin Cheddar and it was delicious!

I had an ice cream cone for dessert.

 And then later in the evening, I got funnel cake and a watermelon drink (drink not pictured)! :)

 Towards the end of the evening, they had fireworks. Overall, it was a pretty fun evening with lots of food, walking, music, and fireworks.

Kristina and Tom and kiddos came into town for a week! Kristina, Lara, and I hiked from Carderock to Great Falls and back the Saturday morning they were in town. It was good sister bonding time!

 My 12 and 14 year old nephews are taller than me! Crazy! :)

Whenever a sibling from out of town comes to visit, we usually try to have a family gathering with all of us in the area. There's always a lot of laughter and fun when we all get together. :)

In this picture, we're sad that the rest of our siblings nor our parents could join us. We had a hard time being serious for this photo. :)

I went to Wolf Trap with some friends from my ward to see a live production of The Little Mermaid. I wasn't sure how they were going to portray being under the water on the stage, but they actually did a really good job with that! It was a cute production!

Recently I've been wanting to try something new. I am not an artist in the least, but I had heard good things about paint nites and how you don't have to have painting or drawing experience to enjoy it. I decided that's the new thing I wanted to try!

I found a paint nite that I was interested in and invited some friends to join me! I loved the experience! The instructor was excellent and the atmosphere fun. Painting is kind of therapeutic and I definitely want to do it again. :)

Happy Independence Day!

I love Independence Day and today was a lovely and relaxing day!

I hung out with some friends!

And we saw an awesome fireworks show near my house!

And because I love this version of this song, I wanted to share it with you all!

Happy 4th of July!

Family Home Evening!

I've had this blogpost in my drafts for quite some time and have finally posted it. I've been in a blogging mood recently and decided it was time for this post. :)

I'm in charge of planning family home evenings (FHE) for the mid-singles in two stakes. I've been doing it for just about two years now and I plan them by myself. Our FHE group is not that big and I think in my particular age group, FHE is not as important as it once was (like in YSA wards). I think people get their social fulfillment elsewhere and not necessarily at church activities anymore. I mean there are various reasons why people don't come and that's okay. But because of this, it makes it a challenge to think of activities that are interesting enough for people to actually want to come to.

I know different things appeal to different people and not everyone is going to like everything. Sometimes I have to think of FHE as just a reason for people to come together and socialize. So even if only one or two other people show up, that's okay. I can still call that FHE a success. (Although sometimes it is stressful not knowing who will be there, it always ends up totally fine, no matter how many or few people are there.) :)

Since I've had to think of a lot of activities, (a lot from the internet, some from other people and some just from myself) I decided I wanted to write down a list of things we've done for future reference. Some of these things we've done multiple times but most of them just once.

-Make ice cream in a bag
-Make dinner for someone in the ward who needed it
-Indexing
-Paper-making (Someone in my ward has the materials to make paper and was more than happy to show us and let us make some paper of our own)
-Frisbee at a nearby park
-Hike at Great Falls
-Make homemade pizza
-Show and Tell (have people bring a souvenir or a favorite or meaningful item from home and talk about it.)
-Play the game Celebrity
-Financial advise class (by a couple in the ward who both work in the finance industry)
-Make bagged lunches for a nearby homeless shelter (coordinating the day and drop off with the shelter beforehand)
-S'mores (over a campfire at family's home in the ward who have a fire pit)
-Halloween party (with Halloweeny food and playing a murder mystery game)
-Watch Father of the Bride
-Draw pictures of our days and then go around the table and talk about our pictures and our days
-Tie fleece blankets for Syrian refugees
-Address envelopes to send out flyers to mid-singles about upcoming activities
-Eat dinner at Three Thai Sushi
-White elephant gift exchange/ugly sweater Christmas party
-Caroling
-Meadowlark Gardens Winter Walk of Lights
-Watch Once I was a Beehive
-Play Two Truths and a Lie
-Play the chimes (someone in our ward has some chimes and was willing to show us how to play)
-Music appreciation night where we shared our favorite songs
-Disney trivia night
-Eat at Silver Diner
-Play human bingo
-Pi day with lots of pies and board games (March 14 or somewhere around there.)
-Sushi making lesson (another mid-single knows how to make sushi and was willing to show us how)
-Easter egg dying
-Thoughts about general conference and banana splits
-Play Nertz
-Bowling at AMF bowling alley in Centreville for $2 Tuesday nights
-A family history consultant in the ward teaching us about familysearch.org
-Dairy Queen
-Had the emergency preparedness specialists in the ward come and speak to us
-Birthday party for everyone with pizza, cake, balloons, games and a sing-a-long
-Gravelly point picnic and games with Potomac Ward
-A couple in the ward showed pictures and talked about their time living in China
-Mini-golf
-Mini-movie making
-Eat at Smash Burger
-Pool party at a couple's pool in the ward
-Frisbee/After frisbee talk about our favorite things to do in the East Coast
-YouTube video party (have people submit their favorite YouTube videos beforehand and then watch them at FHE)
-Letter press (a lady in our ward has a letter press and let us come and make some cards on the press)
-Election party playing an American trivia game
-Going shopping together for non-perishable food items for a Thanksgiving service project in our ward
-Hot chocolate bar
-See lights and nativities at the D.C. temple visitor's center at Christmas time
-Cookie making night (on Sunday night) and caroling (on Monday night. Bringing the cookies we made the night before) at Christmas time
-Board game night (Telestrations, Imagine If)
-Musical FHE (where people share one of their favorite songs and why they like it or they play a song on an instrument they know how to play.)
-Eat at Freddy's and then go to someone's house and watch Princess Bride
-Pancake party (had a pancake mix where you just add water and made pancakes on an electric griddle while we sat around chatting and then ate the pancakes with delicious toppings).
-Learn about Latter-day prophets (asked some people to look up a few facts about a modern prophet of their choice and then share them for the lesson.)
-International food night (have people bring international food to share)
-Volleyball at a local park
-Eat at Cafe Rio
-Eat at Bebop

We usually have awesome turn outs when we go to restaurants! :)

Sandi (and later Trevor) showed up to this FHE! It was a beautiful night and we threw the football around. :)

What are some other FHE activity ideas?

For the Beauty of the Earth!

I've always loved nature and since my trip to Iceland, I want to do more nature only trips. (I've already started planning one for next year, Redwood, Crater Lake, and Lassen Volcanic National Parks in California and Oregon) :)

And you know the awesome thing about nature... it's everywhere. :)

One of the places I like to go that's only about 10 miles from home is Meadowlark Gardens. I love this place! I don't get to go as often as I'd like, but I try to go when I can. I went there recently and I remembered why I love it so much!

Look at that view!

And they have good trails around the gardens!

Isn't it beautiful?!

If you've never been to Meadowlark Gardens, you should go. It costs $5 to get in, but it's worth every penny. :)

Since I can't always go to Meadowlark, I like to walk on trails near my house too. There are some beautiful trails not too far from where I live.

And some beautiful flowers too! (These flowers were blooming recently.)

 These were blooming in April!

This is in my neighborhood! (All of the rest of the pictures (except the last two) were taken on various walks I've been on in or near my neighborhood and I love it!)

The temple always has beautiful flowers! Everytime I go, I ooh and aah over the flowers.  This was back in April.

This was recently.

I wanted to share these pictures from my phone because I think they're beautiful!

"For the beauty of the earth, for the beauty of the skies, for the love which from our birth over and around us lies, Lord of all to thee we raise, this our hymn of grateful praise."

Burger Places!

I do not claim to be a burger connoisseur, but I do have high standards for them when they come from joints that specialize in burgers. This all started when I got a burger at Jack Brown's Beer and Burger Joint in Harrisonburg, VA.

I visited my nephew, Spence, at JMU a couple of years ago and took him out for lunch. Jack Brown's was the place he chose to go and now it is the standard by which I judge all burger joints. :)

I wanted to make a list of my favorite burger joints (and not so favorite) so far. I haven't been to a ton of places yet, so my list isn't very long, but here you go.

Here are my top 5 that I would recommend and would happily go to again (in no particular order)! :) (I'll update this list as I go to more.)

-Jack Brown's Beer and Burger Joint in Harrisonburg, VA. The burger was juicy, perfectly cooked and the flavors were awesome!

-Melt Gourmet Cheeseburgers in Leesburg, VA. This burger was rather large, but cooked nicely with good flavors. I wasn't a huge fan of the shake here, though.

-Big Buns Damn Good Burgers and Beer in Arlington, VA. The burger was cooked perfectly and the flavors were good. The fries were tasty here too and they had good dipping sauces.

-Holy Cow in Alexandria, VA. The flavors of the burger were good but the burger itself was only okay for me. But I would still recommend it!

-Lucky Buns in Washington D.C. The flavors of my burger were unique and delicious together and the burger was cooked just right. (I got Alfie's Bun). I also got fries with curry sauce and I was pleasantly surprised how much I liked them. (I had never thought of dipping fries in curry sauce and it was really good!) 

Here are my bottom 2 and wouldn't necessarily recommend (in no particular order). (I feel bad about it because I know some people like these places, but I personally didn't like them.)

-Elevation Burger. I've been here a couple of times and the burgers were plain and not very flavorful.

-Ray's Hell Burger in Arlington, VA. I don't remember details about this burger, but I do remember being disappointed (especially since the name of the joint would make it seem like they would be devilishly good burgers.) :)

Do you have any burger joint recommendations in the Virginia or D.C. area? Have you been to any of these places? Do you agree or disagree with my reviews?