Archive for March, 2006

DC

Saturday, March 4th, 2006



Eric and I visited DC after the Girl’s Weekend. It was fabulous =)  Abbey uses that word a lot and it seems the perfect description of the week.  The best thing was getting to hang out with Abbey and Brent.  Eric visited the Supreme Court, and absolutely loved that.  Eric had listed Washinton DC as the one place he’d want to go for a long time, so it’s great that he got to go!  Of course, now he has to come up with a new answer for that question.  My favorite part was seeing Tai-Shan at the National Zoo.  You have to get reservations, because the pandas are very popular.  He was so adorable!  I also loved the bonsai exhibit at the arboretum.  Some of the bonsais were almost two hundred years old!  Fascinating.  Abbey and I got to do some scrapbooking.  And we got the circle scrapbook going again.  Eric got to play video games with Brent.  I think that worked out very nicely =)   

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We decided Eric looks a little like Andrew Jackson. I think it’s the fluffy hair
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We had the Lincoln Memorial to ourselves! The best thing about a cold day!
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The FDR memorial is new since I was there, it was great, I love all the quotes!
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Abbey and Brent took us to see Tai Shan, the baby panda. So cute!
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A camellia bonsai. They were amazing, some were 200 years old.

Girl’s Weekend 2006

Saturday, March 4th, 2006



The second annual Girl’s Weekend was another hit! Abbey, Jessie, Jennie and I met in Charleston, South Carolina for a fun filled weekend.  This year we managed to time it much better, so we all got to the airport and left around the same time.  Abbey and I got there first, and then camped out in the Charleston airport scrapbooking while we waited.  We discovered that we would be completely lost if Jennie and Jessie didn’t show, because we had no idea what we were going to do, where we were staying, and the car was in Jennie’s name.  Luckily they made it right on time.  We went straight to lunch, because not only were we hungry, but it’s necessary to feed Baby Hopper regularly.  That’s right, Jessie is having a baby!  It’s so exciting!  When she told me she had to hold the phone away from her ear I was so noisy.  Actually I had to hold the phone away from myself too.  We surprised her with a baby shower.  It was so funny, because you’re not allowed to carry on wrapped presents, so we had packed bags and paper.  While she was in the shower we snuck out the presents and wrapped them.  Then later, when she went to the bathroom, we pulled them out!  Jessie was very happy.  Bathroom equals presents!   We did a lot of fun activities too.  The first night was a dinner cruise on the harbor.  The second day was kind of rainy, but because of that we went to the aquarium, which was awesome!  We met an anteater named Maya, and learned that she can eat 200 ants with one sweep of the tongue.  We later went to the Gibbs art museum, where they had a special exhibit by Margaret Mee, who painted flowers and plants in the Amazon.  It was amazing!  I love her paintings, and I want to learn to do that.  She discovered many new species and recorded them.  I would love to do that.  It was really beautiful!  The next day we went to Magnolia plantation, where we saw many beautiful things.  The camellias were blooming already there, and the daffodils.  We also saw the Audobon swamp garden, which while it had some very cool looking slime, was a bit run down.  The boardwalk was a bunch of plywood boards which were at times very warped and looked like they were about to fall into the swamp.  Then came the interesting part.  There was this sign with a big silly cartoon alligator which said, if you see an alligator, don’t run, it can catch you.  You should instead stare it in the eye, that makes it nervous.  If it does decide to eat you, play dead and ruin its’ fun.  It will lose brownie points.  So at this point we think, oh, ok, there’s not really any alligators here.  This sign is clearly a joke.  Not so.  Fifty feet further down the path we see two alligators sunning themselves on a platform, and they are separated from us by a little bit of chicken wire that reaches maybe as high as my knees!  They seemed awfully close, and we’re thinking, was this sign serious or not?!?  What do we actually do!?!  Anyway, we walked very quietly but steadily down the path till we got away from them.  Whew.  I don’t think the silly alligator warning cuts it.  Anyway.  We went to lots of nice restaurants, and we shopped in the old market of Charleston, where they make lots of cool baskets.  The last day, Jennie took charge and said she wanted to go to the beach.  We were thrilled not only because we’re terrible about making decisions like that but because it was a great idea!  It was chilly, so we had the beach to ourselves.  It was beautiful, and we saw a crab!  And we drew in the sand =)  The best part of the trip was of course, getting to stay up late talking and visiting with such good friends.  The only sad part was that Mary and Alisha couldn’t make it, but we called them while we were there =)  And next year we’ll have another chance!

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Cute frogs! We learned that Abbey loves turtles a lot at the aquarium =)
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Here’s the baby quilt I made for Baby Hopper =)
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The beach at sunset
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Jennie told us a story about the Spanish Moss that hangs in the trees. It was morbid and kind of spooky… I don’t think I’ll look at it the same way anymore =)
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There were cute little statues tucked away in the Gardens. It was so fun to find them.
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I seem to have a thing for moss and slime. It’s cool looking! =)

 

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The girls had a lot of comments to make about my hair. It’s black right now. I dyed it to go to a costume party as Lucy from Peanuts. They were a bit shocked =) It’s also very long because I haven’t really found a hairdresser in Cali. Jessie’s reaction was the most vocal, she said, “what did you do!?!?” And she told Scott I looked like a witch =) It’s definitely a change for me =)