Washington DC Spring Break Part 1

So I guess the biggest news is that Sam surprised me with my birthday present a week in advance so I could have it on our trip. He got me a Canon T3i for my birthday! WOohoo! I am in love! The pic above was taken by my lovely sister with her own wonderful camera and best portrays what I looked like during a lot of the trip. Between her and Sam's brother Jeff, I've been getting some great tips on how to use my camera to it's full advantage and this trip was the perfect way to get in a lot of practice. So these next few posts are total picture overload (no, really) but it's mainly because we were trying to learn and practice a lot with our camera.

Now on to our trip! This is the first spring break we have had in probably 5 or 6 years or so (BYU doesn't have spring break, instead you get let out a week earlier).. We decided to spend our week out in DC visiting my sister Kristin and Neal and doing a little site seeing. We both love the city and were excited to have some time to see some fun stuff this trip. And it was SO fun visiting with Kristin and Neal and their kids. We had a blast! We started out with a nice hike with all the kids on our first morning. Such a beautiful trail with parts of it leading right next to the Patomac River and lots of fun streams. It was awesome:

THE Patomac:

Sam and I would switch off with who had Ivy and who had the camera for much of the week. It's so fun to be learning a new hobby with him! He takes better pics than I do most of the time, lol:

These next couple of Ivy were taken with Kristin's 50mm lens. It was super cool but sort of difficult. I will have to practice with my camera a lot more before getting one of those bad boys...

The next day Sam and I decided to catch the metro into the city to go to lunch and to walk around the DC mall area. It was about a 40 min ride and Ivy loved every bit of it. I was fairly nervous on how she'd do but she thought it was a fun ride. :)

These are the only trees we saw in all the area that were actually blooming. I'm not even sure they are cherry blossoms but we pretended that they were, haha.. Someday we will time it just right to see the infamous cherry blossoms in the city:

I spy Olivia and Fitz! Haha ok not really:

We walked from the Washington Monument down to the Lincoln Memorial.. Vietnam Memorial on the way:

One of my favs:

These were taken the next morning, trying out Kristin's 50mm lens again. Then I tried her telephoto lens after that (the last two pics). I was way across the room so I didn't bother the kids while snapping away. It was cool.

I just love this little bedhead bug:

Little Einstein's is veryy important:

To be continued...

More exploring...

Just some pics from another hike we did a few weeks ago when the weather was perfect. These perfect weather days are few and far between lately so we try to take advantage... This time we decided to check out the trails on the mountains (hills?) right behind Sam's school. They were fun! Not too difficult. And the school lets you rent mountain bikes to take back along these so we will have to try that sometime soon.. I can't wait to see what it will look like in the summertime...

 Our cozy little town of Harrogate... From yet another angle, ha.

 Takin' a break..

 Ivy decided to grace us with her belly button...

Thank you, child.

Crafty crafts and sewing

I don't have any big projects in the works lately so I've just been satisfying my creative apetite with smaller feats. First off, I found this wreath on pinterest and knew right away I wanted to make one but with my own twist.. I LOVE the colors. And the flowers are peonies. They are beautiful in person...

This next project took me a day to complete... I've had these mint capris pants sitting in my drawer for a few years. I've had them for much longer than that, probably since 2006? They were my favorite pants once upon a time when gauchos (sp?) and flare/wide leg capris were popular. Then I got pregnant, had a baby, then skinny pants were in style.. hmm. Thus, they've been a long lost friend in the back of my drawer for sometime now. I came across my friend Merrick's post on refashioning old pants into trendier ones a while back and only recently reminded of it when I ran into my old capris friends when dejunking (spring cleaning much?) our room the other day. So I figured, what the hey! But boy was I scared. I'd never cut up any of my old clothes before. It took me three days just to get up the nerve to do it (probably just because they were such favs and I didn't want to screw it up, haha).. Anyways... I'm so glad I did it! I love how they turned out. Not perfect by any means! But waay better than they were! Now I have cute summer capris! And I didn't have to spend a dime! Yeah!

 Left pic is halfway done, comparing sides.. Right pic is right after I finished..

I already packed up all my winter stuff in hopes that Mother Nature would take the hint.. No such luck. In fact, I think my spring cleaning had the opposite affect. Someday my friends, you will be worn outside my own house. Someday...

Haircut! Finally.

Those who know me fairly well know that I tend to get bored with my hair. I'm always looking to change it somehow, drastic cuts or even just a tint in the coloring (so far no crazy colors yet though). So I finally chopped it a couple weeks ago. I say finally because I think it was a long time coming. I've been thinking of doing it since last summer but just couldn't really commit to the idea for various reasons.. Anywho, glad I did it. And also, glad I didn't do it so short this time so it won't take a good four years next time I decide to grow it out.. 

Before:

Left picture is right after the cut, just a little windy. Right picture is after I got home and super straightened it.. I love it this straight but it usually relaxes back up a lil because I have wave in my hair...

What it looks like most days:

Mom R.'s Birthday take 2 (Jeff's group photos)

Just wanted to post a few awesome photos from Jeff's camera (courtesy of Whitney taking them if I remember correctly) from Mom's birthday bash... Love this crazy family!

This last group shot was, "now everyone touch mom..." lol, in case you were wondering. I have no explanation for the others.....

Thanks for some great photos and awesome memories Jeff (and Whitney)!