Pics from Vacay!

Here we are...promised pics from the recent vacation.  I'm actually kinda proud of myself for remembering. If I don't do it while I am actually thinking about it, there is a very good chance that it won't actually happen. 

Anytime we leave home, we have a 'road rule'...you cannot eat at a restaurant that you can eat at while you are home (i.e., Pizza Hut), and we don't eat at the same restaurant twice, no matter how much we might have enjoyed it.  Now we have actually broken both of those rules every now and again, but for the most part we use them as guidelines.   Well, this King Street Blues in Alexandria, Virginia, has done the ultimate breaking of the rules!   Not only did we eat there TWICE when we were in DC last year, but we specifically went to lunch there on the first day we were there this year, driving there from the airport!   YUM! It did not disappoint, and as I type this I really want the onion straws and the beer cheese dip....*sigh*

We really mainly flew into DC because of the cost of airefare.  We are finding that it is pretty "cheap", at least in comparison to other destinations.  We did not necessarily need, or want, to stay in DC.  We got out of town right after having lunch, heading north farther into Maryland.  I had really only been in the area immediately surrounding DC prior.

Our first stop was to the capital city, Annapolis.  It was a very quaint town, could tell that it was an older town, etc.  It was also a very busy town, as we discovered the following day was the commencement exercises for the Naval Academy, so there were lots of family members, etc., in town; plus, we discovered the President would be in town the next day to speak at the commencement. We knew that we did not want to dally too long.  We did drive by the capitol building but it was too late in the day to tour it, and I did not, unfortunately, get a photo of it.  I learned that it was the first, and only still standing, capitol building constructed of wood.  It was a lovely old building. 

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DC/Maryland/Delaware/Pennsylvania End of School Year Vacation

I usually try to keep up to date on our vacation comings and goings via the blog when we are gone. Unfortunately, I have not been able to do so this time.  I did not take my computer, we took Bruce's along. Unfortunately, he is having an issue with his right now, so we are not able to use it.  This is the first hotel that I have actually been able to sit down and make an entry on our trip.  We are currently on Day 5 I guess. I can't add photos right now either, but I'll try to at least bring up to date what we've done and where we've been, and it will help me remember for the future as well.

Day 1:  Thursday:  Flew out of Kansas City pretty early. Our flight was supposed to leave at like 7:40 a.m., but was delayed, and did not actually leave until like 9:00 or so. That was kind of a bummer.  Plus, security out of KC was a bugger this time. Uusally it is a 'no sweat' pretty easy, although thorough enough, affair, but this time the TSA checkers were GRUMPY with a capital G.  Anyway, we had a good flight and arrived into DC, and got our rental car and basically got out of Dodge.  We drove up into the Maryland area, towards Annapolis.  Check off another State Capital visited, and Capitol building at least driven by. We did not get to go into the building unfortunately.  We took a boat tour of the harbor there at Annapolis. There were a lot of people in the city, and we found out that the Naval Academy's Commencement Exercises were the following day (Friday), so thus explained the large number of people.  We drove around some; charming city.  Headed on up to Baltimore.  Upon first driving into Baltimore, I was initially not too impressed. I was concerned that it bordered on being similar to Detroit, but luckily that impression was short lived.  It is a very charming, busy city with lovely old and new buildings.  Stayed in a Hampton Inn in Baltimore.

Day 2:  Friday:  It was raining for much of the day. We went to the Visitor's Center in the morning.  The Center was very nice, and the workers there were very knowledgeable and very helpful.    Ate dinner at Phillips Seafood Restaurant at the Inner Harbor in Baltimore, a nice local restaurant there.  I went to the Barnes and Noble right next door; it is in an old factory with a large chimney right in the middle that you walk through now. I can't, unfortunately, remember what type of factory it was right now.  Stayed at  Garden Inn by Hilton in Baltimore.

Day 3:  Saturday:  Very much enjoying Baltimore    Allison and I went to the National Aquarium in Baltimore in the morning.  It was okay...I honestly think we've gone to nicer exhibits in other aquariums before.  The building was nice, and we enjoyed it.  There were TONS of people, and it was hard to get too close to see many of the tanks and see the fish very well, which is of course upsetting, especially hard for a little kid.  We then went to Port Discovery, which is the Children's Museum in Baltimore.  Allison of course had a good time there also.   We took the free Circulator Bus down to Little Italy and had dinner at a very nice Italian restaurant. Stayed at a remodeled hotel, the Tremont Plaza Hotel which was a real perk for dad!

Day 4:  Sunday:  Allison and I went to the Maryland Science Center today, after a morning of sleeping in and having lunch at a McDonalds (woo hoo lol) down the street from our hotel.  We got there around 12:00 and told dad he could pick us up at 3:30.  It got to be 3:00 and we were just getting to the 3rd and final floor, so we gave him a call asking for more time.  It was a very cool place, one of the neater science centers we've been to. After we left we left Baltimore and headed up toward Delaware, as I had never been to that state, and Bruce couldn't remember if he had or not.  We ended up having dinner at a nice restaurant off the water in a town called Havre de Grace; it was very much enjoyable and very beautiful evening.  It went downhill from there as we did not have a hotel reservation.  Dad was bargain hotel hunting (especially now that he has found Hotwire deals online for discount hotel rooms).  Well, those cannot be found when one just goes hotel to hotel at 10:00 at night. It was not pretty, and dad had a pretty good meltdown before we settled on a Best Western finally. 

Day 5:  Monday:  Beautiful day...left hotel in Wilmington, DE, with not a lot of options in Wilmington. Bruce mainly wanted to get back out of the city ... "I've had enough city!"  so we decided to head on into Pennsylvania, and head toward Amish/Pennsylvania Dutch area.  Although not as densely appearing populated with tall buildings, etc., the area we drove was pretty dense with businesses along the highway.  It was kind of cool how we would be driving along and then come to an area with a wheat field to the side of the highway.  As we got closer to the Amish area, there was a lot more open acres of ground with farms and dairy cattle, but it was still very settled.  The farms and homesteads are just so beautiful doting the area, with nice, neat, tidy, well maintained homesteads.  We drove the area on Hwy 30, and ended up going to Intercourse, PA, which does produce a smile and perhaps a chuckle, but found a neat little touristy village with a plethora of shopping, etc.  I particularly enjoyed visitng some of the quilt shops. I told Bruce this is why I need to learn to quilt my own, however, because I cannot affor to buy a $1,500 king size quilt.  But, boy, are they lovely!  Tonight we are staying in Lancaster, PA, with plans to explore the area tomorrow. Bruce and Allison went to a Lancaster Mosquitoes Minor League Baseball game tonight.  They have gone to several other minor league games when we have traveled to areas with teams.  :)



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Proud to be a Momma!

"Minor" holidays such as Mother's Day, don't hold a large part in our day-to-day lives here.  This year, however, Allison is of the age, and had some activities in school, that she was such a little treat on Sunday.  She is such a little dickens, and can be quite ornery, and I think she is well on her way to being a mouthy teenager, but she's my little dickens!...and I don't think you are ever quite prepared for the love that a mother feels for her daughter until you are a mother.  She was so sweet and so cute on Sunday trying to do little things for me, saying that she had "presents" for me, which ended up being me helping her put rollers in her American Girl doll's hair, or helping her do this or that....  She did make a lovely pin at school with beads and a "Mom" charm on it, as well as a planter out of tuna can and clothespins, and a cookbook with recipes from all the kids. 

Allison is a great kid.  She has a good heart that I can see coming out often, which is probably the most important quality that a person can have.  After that, the rest will hopefully fall into place.

Thank you Allison for making every day a special Mother's Day with you!

 
 
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Pittsburgh Vacation=Day 9

Flew home! WOO HOO!  Oh, I don't want to sound like I didn't like vacation...of course, I did, but it's always nice to get home when you are supposed to.  There was a weather threat, but we were really lucky and had no issues the entire way (even though we had to go through Chicago, and one never knows what that weather is going to do!).


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Pittsburgh Vacation - Day 8

Pittsburgh Vacation - Day 7

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Pittsburgh Vacation - Day 6

Brrrrrr.....It is cold in West Virginia. When we got up Thursday morning, Bruce took Allison to The Clay Center for a few hours. I walked over there a little later, and when I walked out of the hotel door I was like "whoooooaoooaaa" it was COLD and snowing!  Thankfully it was just a really pretty snow, and it was not accumulating on the ground.  We left Charleston around 1:00 and headed north to start our trek back up towards Pittsburgh.  We stopped in _______________, and went to a museum called the "Blennerhassett" which was named after a 18th Century settler on a little island outside their town. The island does not open until April, but we saw a video and their local/regional history collection.  Their local quilt folks had a quilt show going on as well.  Bruce and Allison went to an Oil and Gas Museum and I took a nap and read in the car :) (I'm not much into oil and gas).  They said it was lacking, but the little old man who was the caretaker was a passionate gem, so that made up for it.  

We drove up County Hwy 2, which follows the river along the West Virginia and Ohio borders, and went through many small towns.  We stopped for dinner at a town called New Martinsville and found a gem of a restaurant. I don't know how to describe it other than a local try on a Golden Coral, but all the food was homemade. It was INSANE, but in a good way.  It was quite a fun find.  The name of the place was Quinet's Court Restaurant. 

We ended up at a hotel that had a coupon in one of those highway coupon guides...ended up taking us over the river into Ohio, which is fine.  We are going to try to explore Wheeling, WV, today before heading back over to Pittsburgh this evening (doesn't look like much in Wheeling, so.....)

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Pittsburgh Vacation - Day 5

After some tense navigating Tuesday evening, and then beginning again to leave Morgantown, we headed down to Charleston.  For whatever reason, Bruce and I are NOT meshing in our driving and navigating, and he is being terribly gruff about it.  Enough to make me want to just yell "YOU DO IT!" but of course I cannot.  It seems that West Virginia streets, roads and highways are a tad different from other places we have driven in that they are not afraid to just switch things up in the lanes on the street, etc.  You can be driving along, happy as a clam, and all of a sudden the lane switches to a different name, number, even direction, turn, one way or the other.  Not only am I to be navigating the map, but I'm also supposed to know when that stuff is coming up.  Never mind the fact that I might also say to drive on a certain road and turn off on xyz street...if abc street comes up first he may go ahead and turn on that, and he will say he didn't know, he can't do it all!!! grrraaarrrgh!

Anyway, thankfully for once in our driving lives, we took the interstate to Charleston, so we had almost 2 hours of peacefulness after I told him he was not to get off of the highway for any reason!!!!  We've only been in the downtown area, and it's a pleasant enough area.  Bruce mentioned later in the evening that it does remind him of Topeka, in that there is worker activity in the daytime, but once 5:01 comes around, everyone heads out and everything closes up.

We started out going to the West Virginia History Center, which although your standard state museum, was very enjoyable. It had a nice array of exhibits, and it even kept Allison's attention. 

The museum and the capitol building, as well as the state office buildings seem to be in the same area, kind of like in a state complex. Just across the walkways and lawns is the state capitol building.  We were late enough in the day that we missed any type of guided tours, but we did just go ahead and go in and walk around.  The House and Senate must still be in session, but were not working directly when we were there. There were all sorts of suits wandering around the building, and the doors to both chambers were open, so we were able to peek inside for a little look.  It is pretty inside, with white marble, but not one of the more ornate capitols we have been in our travels.

We decided to go ahead stay in a Best Western that we found on the edge of the downtown area, down the street from The Clay Center.  That is where Allison is this morning (Thursday); and Bruce went over with her for a little bit. I'm to go over there and take a turn with her in a little while.  As soon as we are done there, we will probably go ahead and head out of town, and start making a turn to the west and then head back up north, making our way back towards Pittsburgh so we are able to fly back out in a few days.

I almost forgot:  Dinner last night was so.much.fun! (thank goodness)  There were not a lot of choices we found out as it seems much of the downtown area closes down at 5:01 as I mentioned earlier.  There was one restaurant, a place called "Pies and Pints", which happened to be open in the evenings. It is a pizza and beer place, but not just any pizza...yummy interesting pizza.  Poor Allison wasn't sure what she had gotten into as she LOVES pizza, but she's used to like Pizza Hut pizza.  We had half Chicken Gouda pizza and half Spinach Garlic and Feta pizza.  OMG!  Both were very good; and even Allison had to admit the Chicken Gouda pizza was good ("I said good, not great"), but the Spinach Garlic and Feta had to be my FAVORITE! It was so good. Just a wonderful mixture of flavors and spices and a little different texture with the feta cheese. It was fantastic!

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