New York City Temple

Darin and I decided a few weeks ago that it was time that we went to the temple!  It had been well over 2 years since we had been to the temple together.  Our temple district here in Pennsylvania is Washington DC which is about 3 hours away.  New York City is +/- 2 hours so we decided to take a trip into the city.  Our good friend Stacia offered to watch Nash for us.  He was so excited to go to her house and play.  The plan was to run into the city do a session eat some lunch and come home.  We figured we would be back by the time he woke up from his nap.  Boy were we wrong!  

We started off realizing that our GPS decided to quit on us, so we stopped at Sams Club and bought a new one.  We then forgot the temple address so we called my mom to look it up for us. (Sadly I do this often!)  Well we made GREAT time to the city only to walk into the front desk at the temple only to find out it was CLOSED!  WHAT?!?  ...Soooo we snapped some pictures to remember that we TRIED and decided to take in some quick sites of NYC and head back home.

This temple is just so odd.  If you were walking by and didn't know it was a temple you would never notice it.


We had never gone to the Empire State building so we decided that it might be fun just to walk by it, then go to Time Square and do some shopping.  First off we both were confused on which building was the Empire State Building...okay I WAS CONFUSED and led us to the Chrysler Building.  Once we got that all straightened out, my feet were KILLING me because I wore Sunday shoes and we made a quick stop at Pay Less to purchase some inexpensive comfy shoes... not to mention a bit ugly...Mission accomplished!  We then got a coupon from a street person for Subway and decided to take advantage of that...I KNOW, I KNOW we are in NYC and we should eat New York food.  Well we were cheap and in a hurry!  When we left Subway I left my old shoes there....GRRRR!!!
Finally we made it to the Empire State Building.  There were some guys on the street selling tickets to the Building and the SkyRide. We were told that with these tickets we would get right in to the IMAX theater ride and then straight up to the top, totaling 30 minutes max....WHATEVER!
This "IMAX" theater ride was a joke.  It was a tiny theater, where you sit on a platform that raises up, down, back and forth.  The film was not well done and I was car sick through the whole thing.  Darin was ticked, he loves IMAX theaters.    After recovering from the movie we were herded like cattle for 2 HOURS up to the top of the building.  We found out that Thursday's and Saturday's were the busiest days in the city....mental note taken!

On the positive side the views were GORGEOUS!

I wasn't able to stay out there very long with my skirt.  It was a bit windy and I was showing everyone a little more then I wanted. :)

Because we were in the Empire State Building for so long we didn't get to do the other things we wanted to do.  We had crazy time getting back to the temple riding the metro and kept getting on the wrong train. Then we took a few wrong turns on the way home.  We ended up not picking Nash up until 7:30pm! 

Nothing went right on this trip and I was a bit preoccupied with being away from Nash.  I had never been away from him for that many hours.  I know he was safe and having a fun time but still it was a new experience.  I am happy I was able to spend the day with my sweetheart and I am grateful we made the effort to go to the temple....hopefully next time we will know if it was open or not!

Thanks again Stacia!  ...and mom for looking up the directions!

Crayola Factory

Darin had this week off from work and we wanted to do some fun family things so we finally made it to the Crayola Factory in Easton.  We joined the Gilstrap and Smith families and about a billion other people!  

Such cute little buddies!

Ya I am thinking it is time to give Nash a haircut!

Our first stop was learning how the factory made crayons and markers.  Tayton was loving it.

Nash loved the free crayon prizes.

The factory has a bunch of different stations where you can try out all the Crayola products.

This was my favorite part.  Nash got to use a marker to draw on glass.  We had him draw us.  He was so serious about it and made sure he got every part of our faces.

This was a fun color wall thing that the kids enjoyed dancing in front of.

Who can't resist a chance to draw with chalk....Nash sure can't!

Play-doh another favorite.  I think we spent most of our time here because it was less crowded.  We lost our group here.

Dirty chalk pants. :)

Then we went to the upper levels which are museums about the railroad and canal boats that were used in this area.  This was less crowded and more enjoyable.

The museum was for kids so everything could be touched and played with.

Nash was naming the boat.

He wasn't to sure about this mule daddy was telling him to feed.  I think he was a little disturbed that it wasn't real.

Darin helped Nash move his boat down the fake canal.

We enjoyed ourselves at the Crayola Factory but we don't think we will be returning anytime soon.

Girls Night

Our ward has grown in the past few months with so many fun new families.  I have become really good friends this summer with most of them especially the new resident wives.  Although, there were a few girls I hadn't been able to get to know.  Thankfully Andrea organized a girls night to Bonefish.  There were 11 of us from our ward and then Andrea invited my friend Christine also, which I was SUPER happy about, Christine is so easy to get along with and one of my closest friends.

(L to R) Christine, Heather, *Andrea, *Alyson, *Stacia, Codi, Brook, *Me, Kristina.  

Not pictured Maria and Jennifer

*the resident wives.

Monday was my 29th birthday so the girls were nice enough to get the waiter to bring me a YUMMY dessert and the table sang Happy Birthday to me. (Thanks Kristina!)  It was a fun night and I am so excited about the next few years we have here in PA.

Carnival at Daddies Hospital

Darin is on an easy rotation right now and is able to get off a little earlier then normal (most days).  He found out there was a carnival outside his hospital in Bethlehem and made sure he got off early to meet us at the festivities.  We invited Emory, CeCe and Christine to join us.  While we were there I received a text from Stacia and they joined us at the last minute as well.  

We started off with the train thinking that would be an easy smooth ride for the little ones.  Emory freaked out and Nash didn't know what to think so he just sat there.  He was the only kid on the train.

We let him go around a couple times before we told the operator to cut it because we could see the tears welling up in his eyes.

Once we got Emory and Nash all smiles again we tried the carousel, something the mommies could ride with them.  They seemed to be okay with that.

Then Nash got a little scared and I had to hold him for the remainder of the ride.

At least CeCe was enjoying herself.

Madden and Tayton were pretty brave and loved the rides.

I am learning to saver these small moments we have together as a family.  It was a short outing but a fun one!  

Nash is growing so fast.  Another year or two he will be riding these rides like a champ!