Two Year Anniversary!

Yesterday was our 2 year anniversary! It's hard to believe it has been that long! But at the same time it's weird that it hasn't been longer...I can't really remember life without Bryce. It has been a great two years and we are ready for the excitement and challenges that lie ahead of us.


It was great that our anniversary landed on a Sunday this year too because we got to spend the whole day together. If it had been any other day Bryce would've been working all day. So after church we decided to drive down to Washington DC. Bryce is in love with that city and we didn't have a chance to stop by the temple last time we went down there. We figured the temple was a perfect place to go and visit on our anniversary! So that was our first stop. And probably our favorite. We went into the visitors center. One of the missionaries put a video on for us about families. I am pretty sure it's because she noticed I am pregnant. But it was really good. Then we walked around for a while and took a few pictures.



Bryce in front of the temple



Bryce had to lay down on the ground to get this shot...pretty cool though eh?


Bryce with the beautiful flowers behind the temple! They apparently are redoing things back there, but it was still a beautiful walk.

After our visit to the temple we drove to the Capitol, the White House, and the Lincoln Memorial. We took our time looking at everything. It was a good anniversary!


Bryce by the Capitol


In front of the Lincoln Memorial. (I was on the phone with my mom and dad)


In front of the White House - Bryce wasn't ready for the picture yet I guess...but I thought it was still a cute picture.


Bryce and Abe



Both of us in front of the Lincoln Memorial. It was really pretty at night.



I would also like to mention that my brother Paul and his wife Molly had their babies last week on August 22! And, I did say babies...they have twin girls! We are excited to go back to Utah and see them. Here is a picture of them together. Congratulations Paul and Molly!!




Aislee and Olivia


We are down to our last few days here in Philadelphia. It has been a good summer, but we are ready to get back to Provo and get everything settled in our new apartment before school starts!

Sister Trip! (minus two sisters)

My two youngest sisters, Jenny and Sarah, came to visit us here in Philadelphia for a week. And what a busy week it was! We went to New York City for two days, saw Longwood Gardens, went to Washington D.C., downtown Philadelphia, and ended the trip by visiting Amish country. It was a lot of fun and it's kind of sad to come home from work to an empty apartment again. But I do have to say that although I am fairly pregnant, I kept up pretty well with the girls. We did a lot of walking!
Now we'll have to plan a trip that all five of us sisters can go on together.

New York City and Longwood Gardens

So our first trip was to New York City. And I was kind of dreading it. I am not a big city person. I was so nervous that we would get mugged or kidnapped or something. I told Bryce before we left that it may be the last time he would ever see me alive. The night before we left for New York I had the hardest time sleeping too because I was having all these dreams, or nightmares I guess, about getting lost and stuff! So I was really glad that everything went well while we were there. We did get lost driving...which really was to be expected. I am the worst with directions and even get confused driving in downtown Bartlesville, which is pretty sad. But we made it to our hotel in one piece and didn't get lost on the subway once!

We went to Times Square, Central Park, saw the Manhattan temple, went to a broadway show (Phantom of the Opera), rode in a taxi with a fingerless driver, took a ferry by the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island, walked by Ground Zero, took a tour of the NBC studios, went to the Empire State Building, and got to all of these places on the subway!

Here are some of the pictures we took. They are mostly of Jenny and Sarah, because it was their vacation and I don't really like pictures too much. I decided to try making a collage of them because we had quite a few. Hopefully it works out okay. I guess I should also mention that Sarah broke her arm playing soccer again a few weeks ago, and that is why she has on a bright orange cast.


1- Jenny and Sarah in the subway 2 - At the top of the Empire State Building 3 - Sarah with a peanut M&M 4 - Times Square at night 5 - J Dawg, S Kid, and P Diddy 6 - Central Park 7 - This one is for mom, Jenny drinking straight from the bottle 8 - By the Manhattan LDS Temple 9 - Jen and Sar in the M&M store 10 - In the Hershey store, aka heaven on earth =)


1 - Sarah looking out over Ground Zero 2 - Palm trees in New York! 3 - Jenny at Ground Zero 4 - Jen with the Statue of Liberty 5 - The girls on the ferry 6 - Sar with the Statue of Liberty 7 - on the ferry with the New York skyline in the background 8 - So this is on here twice, but I don't want to redo the collage, so Jen and Sar at the top of the Empire State Building 9 - New York from the ferry!

We had a lot of fun in New York and were very glad to make it back to our apartment with no problems. We slept in the next day and decided to visit Longwood Gardens that evening. We walked around, took some pictures, and happened upon a Celtic Concert where the Hunt Family Fiddlers were performing! They are really good and we were glad we went when we did so that we could see them. It is a family of 7 kids, 2 girls and 5 boys, that all play the fiddle and dance!


Here are some of the glamour shots we took in the gardens. We were just getting Jenny ready for taking senior pictures. By the end she was pretty sick of me and the camera, but we got some great shots!

Washington D.C. and Philly

We then drove down to Washington D.C. for a day. My mom and dad found a tour bus for us to go on which worked out perfectly. It was air-conditioned and we had the best tour guide ever! We ended up getting lost on our way there again (big surprise) and missed our 10:00am tour, but luckily they had another one at 11:00am that we were able to go on. We had to park far away and take a taxi to make it to the 11:00am tour, but we did make it.


1 - At the Jefferson Monument 2 - On the stairs of the Jefferson Monument 3 - Lincoln Monumnet 4 - Outside the White House gates 5 & 6 - Washington Monument 7 - In front of the White House 8 - WWII Memorial in front of the Oklahoma pillar


1 & 2 - Good times on the tour bus 3 - Jenny in front of a shrine, apparently there is no other building like it in the western hemisphere 4 - Sarah got some sort of prize or certificate from the Environmental Protection Agency for her science fair project last year, so we thought she should take a pic by their building

On Sunday we went to Philadelphia with Bryce. I'd had enough driving and getting lost, so we planned it so Bryce could drive us to our last big city on his one day off. We probably took the most pictures while we were in Philly, which is funny because we were there for the shortest amount of time.


1 - Jen by the Liberty Bell 2 - Sarah in front of Independence Hall 3 - Jenny with her new whistle in front of Independence Hall 4 - Sar and the Liberty Bell


1 - Bryce in front of George Washington 2 - Bryce and Independence Hall 3 - Bryce and Kathleen in front of Independence Hall 4 - Jenny and Sarah by George Washington


We decided to try a philly cheesesteak from both Pat and Geno's. They are right across the street from each other and we heard that Pat's is better. So we tried one from each and decided that although they are basically the same...


Geno's is the better choice!

After eating a philly cheesesteak we went to the Philadelphia Museum of Art (or the Rocky stairs). Bryce, Jenny, and Sarah had a race to the top and we took tons of pictures.


Running to the top and celebrating once they got up there!


By the Rocky statue. Bryce and I from the top of the stairs. Bryce stopping to take a drink after running to the top of the stairs. (he didn't actually drink this water, just pretended to)

And finally...the Amish

On the last day of the girls vacation we decided to take it easy and drive out to Amish country. We basically just wanted to buy some jam and other Amish things. We stopped at a little shopping village in Intercourse, PA (I know...what a name right?). We ate some lunch, got some homemade Amish jam, a few candles, some fudge, and we also tried some homemade ice cream made fresh from Jersey cows. It was sooo good. Tasted just like an ice cream sandwich (it was cookies and cream).


1 - Amish country! 2 - Eating lunch 3 - In front of a buggy 4 - Picture Sarah took from the car on the drive home, it is a beautiful drive and we saw all kinds of buggies on the road.


1 - Sarah in front of Bob Burnley's ice cream scoop collection 2 & 3- Berry Jenny and Sarah 4 - Jen eating some homemade Amish ice cream

After Amish country we went and saw a movie, Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants 2. It was such a fun week and I am so glad they came out to visit us!! I miss them already...

I also had to add this video. Sarah bought a whistle in Philadelphia and was playing on it all night. I thought it was really funny because Jenny says "for the love" during the middle of the song. haha...oh funny. Do you see how fun they are??!!

Washington D.C.

We decided to drive down and do some sightseeing in Washington D.C. this past Sunday. It is only about a two hour drive from where we live. We left Sunday afternoon and didn't really have enough time to see everything. Bryce said we definitely have to go back. Our camera also ran out of battery, which was a bummer. We visited Arlington National Cemetery, rode paddle boats on the Potomac and saw the Jefferson and Washington Monuments from there, and then we decided to walk up to the Washington Monument. You have to have timed tickets to go to the top of the Washington Monument, and they were all given out by the time we got up there, but we got lucky and were still able to go to the top of it! It was pretty cool. After the Washington Monument I had had enough walking around in the heat and was ready to go home. It was so HOT! We will for sure have to go back and see more and bring some water or something with us next time.


All hail King Bryce! This was by the tomb of the unknown soldier.


Bryce in Arlington Cemetery


View from Arlington Cemetery


Paddle boating on the Potomac - that's the Jefferson Monument in the background


There were quite a few helicopters flying by while we were on the paddle boats. Bryce was like "I bet that's the President!" so he took a picture. I was a little more skeptical, but we did learn later that the President was in fact on one of the many helicopters that flew over us!

Other than our trip to DC things haven't been too exciting for us lately. We only have about a month left to spend here in Pennsylvania.

Update on our lives...

I left Bryce over the 4th of July to visit my family in Oklahoma. My sister, Chelsea, had her wedding reception there on the 5th and it was a good time to just go home for a few days since the next time we'll be there will be Christmas with a new baby! So I was a little worried about leaving Bryce all by himself for about a week but he still had an enjoyable fourth of july hanging out with some of the single guys in the office here and then just working all day every other day like usual. I think he is mostly glad to have me back because I make dinner for him and while I was gone he would either not eat or eat out. =)

Anyway, my trip to Oklahoma was great! I stayed with my sister Jessica, who lives near Tulsa, the first day I got there. We went and played at Pottery Barn Kids, went to the library, and Jess showed me how to do things on photoshop. Now I just have to get the software for myself. For the fourth we just hung out and then went out to the farm for the famous Vaclaw fireworks. And like I said, my sister Chelsea had her reception which turned out really well. I got to help set up for it and everything. I hardly took any pictures while I was there, but here are a few from the reception.

Here is me with my three little sisters. This was right before the reception started.



Helping Sabrina drink her juice. Isn't she just so cute?

On Monday my mom and sisters threw a baby shower for me. It was so nice! We had some gooood food and really cute decorations. Jessica made a diaper cake that was so cute! I got some really cute clothes for the baby which I am really excited to try out. I also never realized how TINY newborn diapers are! I guess babies do come pretty small. =) But it was so great and I really appreciate them doing that for me right after doing everything for Chelsea's reception.


The diaper cake!! And my sister thinks she's not very creative...psshh.


Opening presents.

I decided to post the last picture I ever will of my growing tummy. It seems more fun to do this early in the pregnancy...when you're not really that big. But I just thought I'd give a little update. Bryce Jr. is definitely growing! He kicks a lot, especially in the ribs, and gives me a lot of heartburn as well.


27 weeks pregnant...and getting bigger...every day...

So that is what has been going on with us lately. Bryce is still doing really well with his selling. In fact, he just hit his next payscale this past weekend which means I get to take him out to a nice steak dinner (one of the incentives we made for him as a reward for his hard work).