Time for Andy to contribute to this thing again. I've been tasked with writing about our adventures in Gettysburg and Baltimore. We actually went to Gettysburg a couple of months ago I think. Now I've got to find out the date, or it's going to bug me..... Looks like it was the first weekend in August. We went down on Friday night and spent the night in King of Prussia, PA, just outside of Philly. The mall there is huge, but more importantly, they have a Cheesecake Factory. I'd never eaten there before, but it was great. Huge menu, good food, and decently priced. Great combination! Got to say though, I've never been into cheesecake (nasty stuff that cream cheese). Kristi got the brownie cheesecake to go, and back to the hotel. She was raving about it so much, I figured I'd give it a shot. Big mistake. That stuff was AWESOME!!!! Great. Now I'm addicted. I drag the poor girl there every chance I possibly get. The good news is that we branched out and tried the Godiva chocolate cheesecake, and it was WAY better than the brownie one, and that's saying something. Our nearest Cheesecake Factory is about 30 minutes away, so it's not like we can eat there everyday (phew!), but I'm confident they'll get to know us.

John Faust sent me a CD with 3 albums worth of Brazilian MP3s a couple of weeks ago. This Tribalistas CD is pretty kickin'. Not usually my sort of thing, but this is some good stuff. Passe Em Casa - great track.

So, on to Gettysburg. We wandered westward across southern Pennsylvania on Saturday morning. I had to make a little detour through Amish country (Bird-in-Hand and Intercourse, to be exact). It was fun to see the nice Mennonite lady (traditionally dressed) out with her leaf blower. Actually, I don't think that we saw any true Amish while were there - I'd be surprised if we did anyways. We probabably got to Gettysburg around 1pm. When I came here a few years ago with my family, we did a tour with a battlefield guide that actually got in our car and pointed out everything as we drove around. It was one of the coolest things I've ever done. Kristi's family did the same when they were out here at the 4th of July, and their guide was kinda dull. So we were a little concerned with what we were going to get - it was really up to the luck of the draw what kind of guide we would get. We decided to go for it though, and we definitely came away pleased. I think the guy was actually in the Civil War. Older, unkempt, ragged hair, blind in one eye. I took one look at the guy and knew we were going to have fun. Kristi told him that she was more interested in human interest stories, and he certainly disappoint. He was constantly interrupting his narrative with some little story that he'd just remembered about an event that happened at the location that we were driving past. He was a hoot!

After we finished up the tour, it was time to head back to Jersey City - about 3 hours. I wasn't looking forward to it after a full day of driving, but we toughed it out. We even made a little time to detour through Hershey so Kristi could see the town, and the fun little street lights shaped like Hershey Kisses.

Our last excursion was to Baltimore to check out the Inner Harbor. That was another place that I'd been a few years ago with my family. (We did all of that stuff with Dave & Pam when they lived out in Harrisburg.) The central attraction of Baltimore's Inner Harbor (very cool place) is the National Aquarium. They've done some work on it since I was last there, and they are adding on a whole new wing (Australia) that is supposed to be finished in 2005 - guess we'll just have to go back.

National Aquarium

The drive down to Baltimore wasn't too interesting. Lots of traffic after you get off of the Delaware Memorial Bridge as it collapses traffic down to 2 lanes - stupid. Then we passed a column of motorocycles (going the other way, thank goodness) that had to be a couple of miles long. The police were holding up traffic for them, so it was obviously some sort of ride for charity, or something like that. We tried to swing an early check in at the Renaissance in Baltimore, but since I'd gotten the room for so cheap on Priceline, they weren't going to let that slide - we didn't actually get checked in until around 5:30pm. Anyways, we wandered around the harbor for a while - there's lots of shops and junk there - just stuff to see. Sunday morning was the aquarium, and then we took the long way home. We wandered south of Baltimore a bit to Annapolis. When I lived in DC I'd heard that it was a pretty cool place, but we never went. I just wanted to take a peek at the Naval Academy. Turns out that it's this really cute old town, with a fun mainstream, and a cool vibe. I imagine that we'll end up going back some weekend and staying in a B&B down there. We crossed over the Chesapeake Bay, and drove back up through eastern Maryland (which is all farmland, in case you were wondering.)

I think that our next trip may not be until our Anniversary. We're heading up to Vermont for the weekend - that's gonna be a blast. But we've spent a lot of dough on travel this year - all of the trips to UT, the trip to Austria, Greece, and Israel for early next year, and today I just blew $760 on flights for Christmas. So we're going to try to be good for a little while. We'll see how I hold up......

Andy and I knew that we'd get some good church callings since we are from Utah and everything!! But I wasn't quite prepared for the call that I got!!! I was called to be the early morning seminary teacher!!!! It was a bit of a surprise! After discussing it with the CES leader though I think we've determined that it may not work to have it early morning. We are probably going to do it homestudy where they study on their own and we meet once a week for a lesson. It's not the ideal situation for the kids, but because of where they live and their income level, it's not really feasible for them to come every morning. They didn't have a teachers manual or enough student manuals though, so I'm not really even sure when I'll be able to start. The kids already started school last week, but we'll have to wait a bit longer. It sounds like there are only 4 kids. I only know who one of them is and he seems like a sweet kid. These black kids are going to have to learn to love their white bread teacher!!!!!!

Nothing too exciting for this blog! (thank goodness) We were able to go home to Utah the end of Aug and first 2 days in September for Labor Day. It was a great getaway! We got to Utah around noon on Friday and ate some Brand X hamburgers!!!! Yummy! Saturday morning we drove up to Fairview with the whole family. Greg brought his parents 4-wheelers and we had a good time driving them around. I'm kind of a chicken, so I wanted to head back earlier than Richele and Greg, but oh well. They were sweet about it. We played games, and cards, and ate, and talked, and slept, and just relaxed. It was great because it was slightly chilly which we weren't used to. It was nice to have to bundle up a bit. We played with Chad's paintball gun, and horseshoes, and wrist rocket. Needless to say, there were plenty of things to keep us busy!!! We made some dinner and smores and then crowded into the trailer to watch a movie. We all went to bed that night and had a great night (at least I did!). We woke up and had a big breakfast and then packed up and went back. We got home and just cleaned up in time to go to church. We had a nice regular Sunday afternoon and evening. Monday everyone had off of work so we ate at Red Robin and went to a movie. Andy and I did a little bit of shopping in the meantime. We are now the classic non-Utah Mormons who go to Deseret Book when they go to Utah!!!! What can we say!!
We caught a flight home Tuesday morning and got back late that night. It was a great trip home and so fun to visit the family. Hopefully my next visit there will bring a baby!!!!!