Project Past Times

While Jake and I have been staying with my parents in Preston, I have kept myself busy working on different projects. Jake finished his class and I made decorations for our home...(hopefully we have one soon.)  :) Here is what I've made:

 

I have also been working on a kitchen table with my dad. We are getting close to having it finished. We have one more final coat to do. Here are some pictures of the table after being stained, but it does not yet have any filling or final coats on it. We built it out of mahogany. 

pompeii

Buona Notte!

Today was pretty awesome. We took a train from Naples 45 minutes to Pompeii and the base of Mount Vesuvius. We spent hours walking around the city of Pompeii. It was absolutely amazing. They had people that had been petrified by the volcanic ash on display as well as a dog that had been petrified as well. We saw houses, arches, the city park, the bathing house, and the amphitheater. On our audion tour guide it told about one house that had stables in it where a horse skeleton was found with a harness on it. The city was really amazing to see..so much of ancient Itailian, especially Roman, lifestyle has been preserved.

After touring Pompeii, we came back to Naples and ate at a local ristorante. We ordered spaghetti with a side of octopus salad. We ate octopus!! I thought the octopus salad was going to be a salad with some octopus. Nope. It was just cut up octopus tentacles.

After dinner we went further into the city on the train to the archeological museum. It was really fascinating. They had 2nd century statues and artifacts found at Pompeii.

We just got back to the hostel and are going to chill out for a while. Then we are going out for some pizza tonight!

naples

Our next stop is Naples. We were going to go to another town in Sicily called Siracusa, but the train was scheduled to leave too late in the day. So we decided to skip it and head straight to Naples. It was an overnight train, but we weren't able to get a bed. We "slept" in a coach that had six seats and four people. It was very uncomfortable. I would wake up every little while with a dead leg or tingling arm. We made it to Naples at 5 this morning. We found a hostle nearby and crashed. There is an LDS branch about 3 kilometers away that we were going to try to catch at 9:30. At 1 this afternoon we woke. I guess we weren't going to church.
We walked down the street and found a pizzeria to eat at. Naples is the place where pizza was invented....and the pizza here is amazing!! But the whole city is really dirty. There is garbage everywhere..all over the streets and sidewalks. Dumpsters are tipped over with garbage scattered everywhere. It is really gross. Tomorrow we will be going to Pompeii. It should be way fun!

italy trip. may 2011.

Jake and I have been backpacking around Italy for three days now. We left late Monday afternoon, took a train and went to Rimini, a cute town on the Mediteranian Sea. We got there late Monday night so we stayed in a hostel called 'Sunflower Getaway' or something hippy like that. The whole place was themed off of Austin Powers the Spy Who Shagged Me...yes, I got pictures.
On Tuesday we walked along the beach then took a bus to a country called San Marino. The whole country is basically a medevil castle. Really cool. We waked around the fortress for the rest of the day. That night we caught a night train to Messina, Sicily. It was close to 15 hour ride. The train had coaches with bunks in them. Ours had 4 beds total. Our two other riding companions were both guys, one of which would have won gold in the olypics for snoring. Once we got to Messina, we caught a 2 hour train to Paleremo. We got there later yesterday afternoon, so all we had time for was wondering around...which led us inside a really old catholic cathedral, which was still being used for worship. We also ate at a real Italian restaurant for the first time! It was really good. Neither of us could read what was on the menu, so we asked the lady what was good. Jake ended up with spaghetti with bacon in it. It was really good...tasted similar to Mac and cheese. I got spaghetti with shrimp, roasted tomatoes, and clams in it.
Today we spent most of the day in Palermo. It was really cool. We went to a cathedral that had gold everywhere, and murals, and was really old. We also went to the catacombe del cupacini, also known as the catacombs of the cupichans. Hundreds of skeletons that are amazingly preserved. There is one in there named the bambina (little girl) who was so well preserved that it looked like she was lying there asleep...all her hair was there and skin..everything. It was really amazing.
We then took a train to Agrigento, Sicily. We found a cute little hostel for the night owned by this really old lady who doesn't speak a lick of anything that is not Italiano. Tomorrow we will be sight seeing all of Agrigento and then catch a train to our next stop..wherever that may be. The famous spot in Agrigento is the Valle Dei Templi, which means the Valley of the Temples. There are four temples that are still standing today located within a mile. There are also tons of ruins, including the ruins of the great Temple of Zues

The Capitol of the United States of America

On Saturday, we toured the Capitol building. A friend of Jake's from USU has an internship with Senator Hatch and pulled a few strings to give us a personal tour. Michelle, Reed, Christy, and the kids joined Jake and I on the tour. It was really fun. Isaac had a lot of really cool facts to share.

 After our tour, Jake, Isaac, and I went to We The Pizza, a restaurant opened up by a guy who was on America's Top Chef. Super. Good. I highly recommend it. We talked for a couple of hours then caught the metro back home. What a fun day!!

This is the stop we got off at. It is on the same line as us and not too far away. 

Capitol

Freedom statue on top of the dome of the capitol building

Freedom Statue

Looking at the ceiling of the dome from the inside. The dome is 180 feet from ceiling to floor. 

A close up on the mural in the center of the dome. This picture takes up 1400 sq feet.  It features George Washington on a throne with justice and fame on either side of him. There are 13 virgins surrounding him representing each of the first 13 states. Around them are 5 pictures of attributes. I can't remember them all, but there is liberty, strength, science, etc..

All the around the top of the wall is a mural showing different events in the history of the USA. It is 8 ft tall, though it doesn't look like it. This section shows the building of railroads.

This section shows Cortez. I am not sure why this is on the wall of the Capitol building..

Each state gets to choose two important people from their state to have a statue made of them and put into the Capitol Building. Utah chose Brigham Young as one of its statues. I think the requirements to have a statue made of you is you have to be dead for 21 years.

This is the statue room. Statues of the representatives from each state surround the room.

Me, Jake, and Brigham Young.

This is the Supreme Court building.

Date Night

Tonight was date night! It was probably one of the funnest nights EVER!

I picked up Jake from work at 6:45, then we came home and made pizza together for dinner. We ate it all up before I had a chance to take a picture of it. This is all that is left..

After we made pizza, we made a FORT in the front room! I put Jake in charge of the construction...he was SO excited. We pulled chairs together and draped blankets over everything. Jake "laid the carpet" on the inside, while I pilled the pillows.

(NOTE: the 'carpet' was just another blanket.)

I made some popcorn while Jake got the laptop set up with a movie. We crawled inside and watched "Strange Brew".

We slept in our fort.

THE FORT

Inside our fort!

We were sleeping...

"laying carpet"

The Entrance

catching up to speed

It has been a while since I last posted..not much has happened. 


Jake has been jumping clients this week, which he is really liking. He has helped at the McLean office, a client in Fairfax, VA, and, for the past couple of days, he has been at a client site here in Arlington. He really enjoys moving around and being with different teams and in different places. He is gaining confidence and skill in the tasks they assign him. Because this last site is so close, I have been dropping him off at work. It is extremely nice because I get to have the car all day. 


I have been bored, as usual, entertaining myself with homework, pacing the house, straightening things, and making Thank You cards. 


For Family Home Evening this week, we went through our finances trying to figure out where we stand. It was fun and very helpful. We hope to continue to overview our financial standings monthly.


I think we are all up to date now. 

Haircut

Here are the mug shots. I cut my hair a couple of days ago! I cut about 5 inches or so off. The hairstyle is called an A-Bob where one side is an A-line cut and the other side is a Bob. So one side is a little longer then the other. I wanted something a little different..and I got it!

22 Hour Power Outage

Wednesday afternoon it started hailing, sleeting, snowing, raining--you name it, it was probably happening--I was just leaving work in Maryland to catch the Metro home. The weather was pretty nasty, but very typical in Utah and Idaho. When I got to the Metro Station to transfer from the Red Line to the Orange Line, I think they shut all but the Orange Line down. There were a ton of delays and problems all around. My 15 minutes ride from the Metro Station to my stop took 45 minutes.

Jake was sent home at 3:30 due to poor weather. I called him and asked if he would pick me up at the Ballston Metro Station, which is closest to us. We live 2 miles from that stop, and I did not want to walk home in the dark and the storm. By the time I came up from underground, there were a couple inches of snow on the ground and it was snowing harder and harder. It took Jake half an hour to come pick me up. He couldn't get out of the driveway. 

Needless to say, we made it home safe and sound. I made a batch of taco soup for dinner. While eating dinner, the power went out. We were expecting it to happen because we have lost power 3 times already since living here. We crawled upstairs to our bed and with the last remaining battery power of both of our laptops combined, we watched 2 episodes of Chuck. 

We woke up the next morning to find that the power was still out. Jake had a part of a snow day, so he didn't have to be to work until 10:30. I tested the shower first. Luckily, our water heater still worked. The toaster, oven, microwave, fridge, and all other kitchen tools were dead. I tried to think of what to make for breakfast. The stove is gas powered. So I turned on the gas and lit it with a match. At least the stove worked. I heated up the taco soup from last night and we ate it for breakfast. 

I drove Jake to work today because I had lots of errands to run. I went grocery shopping, cut my hair, went to the post office, went to the bank. I arrived back home at 3:30 to find the power was still out. I cuddled in my coat and read a book. Then I washed dishes by hand, because the dishwasher wasn't working and we were in desperate need of clean dishes. 

At 5:15 the power came back on!

I left to pick up Jake from work. When we got home, there was a puddle of water on the kitchen floor from where the freezer had defrosted. We cleaned up a little then had taco soup for dinner. We called my family on Skype and had a really fun time talking to them. Then we went to bed!

There are some things you don't realize how wonderful they are until you don't have them any longer. I definitely appreciate how much easier electricity makes our lives.

Snow!

Wednesday night.

Wednesday night. This is our front porch. We had just gotten back from picking me up from the metro. We still had power. The snowflakes were huge making everything beautiful.

Thursday morning, looking off of the porch. Jake's head is in there too. :)   I found out that a transformer had blew on a highway near our neighborhood, which caused us to have no power for so long.

Thursday morning. Our rental car covered with snow. None of us have power, so all the houses are dark. Everything is covered in snow. There is probably 5 inches or so. This area is not very well prepared for bad weather, so many of the side roads were not plowed.

Jake shoveling the walk Thursday morning. The snow was very wet and very heavy...great for a snowball fight. By the way...I won.

Saturday is a Special Day

Last night we set the alarm for 7:00 am in hopes that we would wake up and go to the gym. The alarm went off this morning. Jake jumped up to turn it off. We instantly fell back asleep, waking up again at 9:30. We laid in bed coming up with reasons why the other should get up first.

Me: "you are older, you should get up first and set the example"

Jake: "you are a girl, you should get up first"

Me: "you drink more pepsi..."

Jake: "you are better looking"

Me: "you have man parts"

Jake: "you don't have man parts"

After a few minutes of this (our still-waking-up-minds were having a hard time coming up with good reasons) Jake pushed me off the bed. In my panic of falling off the bed, I grabbed his waist and pulled him off with me. I guess we both made it out of bed. But we did not go to the gym..

"Let's go to McDonald's for breakfast!" I yell from the basement after seeing 4 coupons for 99¢ sausage and egg mcmuffins. We throw on our pajama's and yankee ballcaps and rush out the door. While in the drive thru, I was ordering our breakfast, when suddenly I hear a lady's voice shouting "are you almost done ordering?" I look in the rear view mirror and the lady in the car behind us had gotten out of her car to yell at us. We had only been there a couple of minutes. But she was so upset that we did not order our stuff within 30 seconds of her pulling up behind us. Only in DC...

This afternoon we went to a session at the Washington DC temple with our ward. Before getting in the car, I asked Jake where are temple bags were. He thought about for a second..."They are in the trunk...O crap! They are in the Mazda." (our Mazda is currently at the car hospital getting repaired) So we had to rent temple clothes. The temple was CRAZY. I was lucky to find an empty locker. The endowment room our ward was assigned to had filled up by the time we got there. So we, along with half of our ward, waited 20 minutes for the next endowment room to open up. The room was completely filled. Afterwards, we had a meeting on the very top floor of the temple, in the Priesthood Room. Only by direct First Presidency Permission are meetings allowed to be held in this room. Our stake had gotten this special permission in preparation for stake conference. All of the stake members, dressed in white, filled the entire room. This room fills the entire floor of the temple. The Temple President, Matron, and I am guessing our Stake President spoke about returning to the temple often. 

We drove through downtown Washington DC on the way home, crossing the bridge over the Potomac River. It is a really cute town. 

It has been a tremendously fun day today...and now the rest of our night will be comprised of buying soy ice cream and watching the Godfather.

Balti Butter Chicken Curry

While hanging out with Michelle earlier this week, I bought some Indian pre-made mix packets. Michelle and I went to an Indian market to pick up some ingredients she needed for a soup. She had me buy some packets that had spices mixed together to make different Indian dishes. I also got some chili paste, non-bread, and mango chutney. 

Tonight, I decided I was going to make an Indian meal. I made rice (without a rice cooker, I might add. And this time it came out as rice and not oatmeal!) and added a yellow rice spice to it. Then I sautéed chicken and onions in butter and poured the spices on it. We had a salad on the side.

I am new to the whole cooking thing, but I LOVE it!! Michelle is always giving me tips and ideas for what to do. I really enjoy cooking fancy meals. I would like to learn to make pastries and breads and start branching out into different cultural foods.

Our Street

Update at the Reed's

This week has been extremely busy for me and not quite so busy for Jake. I spent Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday in Maryland. I have a nanny job in Silver Springs, Maryland. It is about an hour long metro ride, I stay for 5 hours then ride the metro back home. It is really fun. The kids are adorable. There are 3 kids: ages 4 1/2, 3, and 15 months. It is more like a mother's helper position. I help out with the kids, reading and playing the piano with them. I go twice a week.

On Tuesday, I took the metro up to North Bethesda, Maryland to hang out with Michelle, Christy, and the kids. It was really nice and chilled out. I really liked not being at home. Last night, I went to an Enrichment Activity. The lesson was taught by a Hebrew/Judaism scholar. She talked about the role of Eve and cleared up some of the translation errors. It was really interesting looking at Eve from the side of direct, literal Hebrew to English translation. 

Since I haven't had any time this week to do house work, I have devoted today to do it, cleaning and organizing everything. Tonight I am making an Indian meal: Butter Chicken Curry, yellow rice, and a salad. I am very excited. I'll let you know how it goes.

Jake is only working a 40 hour week. He has been getting home around 6. It has been nice having him home. The only problem is that I have been busy at nights, so I am not home when he is. I think he is enjoying it, though. It is nice to have some time to yourself on occasion. Jake is surrounded by crazy auditors all day long, he deserves some alone time.

Chocolate Cake

Today I made my very first ever Chocolate Cake! I also made for the very first time buttercream chocolate frosting. It is Krista's (my boss) birthday today. I dropped Jake off at work and drove to work. Her husband took her out to lunch, so I watched the kids. We decided to make a cake for her birthday. We found a recipe on the internet...and gave it a try. We started with the frosting. When we got to the mixing part, Charlotte, the youngest, woke up and started crying. I brought her down to help. But she had a meltdown when she found out her mom was not there. She was screaming, I was using a beater to make frosting, the two boys kept pouring powdered sugar and milk into the bowl. It was an adventure to say the least.

Glen and Krista got back and called Charlotte down. Next we made the cake. After stirring everything together, we stuck it into the oven. The boys went up for nap time, so they weren't there to finish the cake. It was time for me to go, so I put the frosting on top. The cake was still warm, so the frosting melted everywhere.

I had so much fun making this cake. I brought home a couple pieces for Jake and I to eat. I don't even like chocolate. Or cake, for that matter. Jake informed me that he isn't a fan of chocolate cake either. But tonight we feasted on it. It was so good! ...for chocolate cake. I think the only reason I liked it is because I made it. :)

Callings and Home Teachers

We got a call from the 1st counsellor in the Bishopric. He asked us if we could meet him at 11:30 Sunday morning.

Our home teachers scheduled to visit Sunday at 10:30.

Jake and I rolled out of bed around 9:30. I jumped in the shower first so I could fix breakfast while Jake took a shower. As I got out, I heard Jake answer the phone. He hung up and gave me a slightly panicked look, "our home teachers are here." I glanced at the clock. It was 9:57.
"They are a little early," I commented.
"I know. They said we were their 10:00 appointment."
I threw on some sweats and Jake tried combing his hair down, giving up after a second, and rushed downstairs. We let them in and we all sat down in the front room. Come to find out, while the one was sending out email confirmations to all the families, he was at the movie theaters with his kids and he had double booked 10:30 accidently. They apologized for the mistake, and we laughed about it for a while.

After they left, Jake and I got ready for church and ate breakfast. We drove to the church to meet with Brother Lucia, the 1st counsellor. He asked if we would be willing to serve in the nursery. We accepted and were set apart after all the meetings. We went to nursery for the first time today. There are 16 kids, and 16 kids recently left for sunbeams. We had a lot of fun playing with toys, singing songs, and eating goldfish. I think this will be a fun calling. The only problem is we wont be able to meet people as easily. But we get to play for 2 hours, how fun is that?

Car Accident

Jake got in a car accident this morning. On his way to work -about 8:30 - he was T-boned by another car on the passenger side. Due to Virginia morning traffic, cars will stop at the crosswalk before entering the intersection on green lights because the traffic in front of them isn't moving. Jake needed to make a left hand turn. Intersection was empty, all the cars were stopped. But, during traffic hours, the parking lane is made into a driving lane for convenience. This makes it difficult, though, because there are so many blind spots. Jake didn't see any thing, and the car driving up to make a right hand turn didn't see anything either. Half way through Jake's turn, the other driver realized it was not clear and slammed on his brakes, but it was too late and plowed into the Jake. 

The Mazda was hit between the car doors on the passenger side. They had a crazy tow guy come to take it to a repair shop that Geico said to go to. But the tow guy didn't want to go there. Jake got in the front, told the guy where to go, and then started figuring things out on his phone. After they parked, Jake went in to the main office to get a business card, and realized that the guy had taken him to the place he wanted to go, not the place Jake had told him to go. Jake went running back out to find the car off the tow truck. He marched up to the tow guy and said 'you took me to the wrong place. I want to go to this other repair place.' And the guy answered saying, 'no, the other place is too far away and we are already here.' So Jake finally demanded the guy to take him there. (I am paraphrasing because I was not there...this is just what was told to me when Jake called) Come to find out, the place that Geico said to go to was only a couple minutes away and the driver was just being a stinker about it.

Anyway, it sounds like everything is sorted out. Jake is fine. No injuries. After he got the rental car, he went straight to work. I think the car will be fine too. We will get it back as soon as it is fixed. We were so blessed that nothing too serious happened. We recently - as in just a couple of weeks ago - changed the auto insurance from liability to full coverage.

I don't know if there were any pictures taken. I have no idea how bad the car looked.. If I get any pictures, I will post them.

Home Sweet Home

Here are some pictures of the house we are staying at in Arlington. We are house-sitting for a lady who left to Florida for the winter. These pictures were taken a couple of days ago. It is the first of January and we don't have any snow yet. The weather has been pretty nice, staying in the 30s and 40s. Today, though, we woke up to a thin layer of snow on the ground. The area we live in is a cute residential area a mile and a half away from the greater Arlington area where the big buildings (20 stories or so), restaurants, malls, and company offices start. I really like the Arlington area. It is big but it feels safe and inviting.

Photos courtesy of the camera my family gave us for Christmas!

The shed in the backyard.

Our Home

  

Front Room

Dining Room

Kitchen

  

Kitchen

Looking down our street from the porch.

Front Room

Master Bedroom. (The Superman pillow is Jake's)

Bathroom