• Pacific Northwest Trip - Day 1 Quinault Rainforest, Kalaloch & Ruby Beach, and Olympic National Park
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    Pacific NW Trip: Quinault Rainforest to Olympic National Park

    June 27, 2019 - By 

    Today, I’m going to start sharing with you about our trip to the Pacific Northwest. Rob had a conference at the University of Washington in Seattle, so we decided to make a vacay out of it. Alex, Rob and I left out one Friday after work and booked it over to Atlanta for our flight. We arrived at Sea-Tac around midnight, which was actually 2am our time. Some of slept a little bit on the plain and of course the adrenaline was flowing so we were doing good. We drove from Seattle to Auburn, WA, which is about 18 miles…

  • New York Highlights
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    New York City Highlights

    June 1, 2019 - By 

    Over Christmas break, we made a trip to New York City. So much fun! This post is a summary of each day with links to each daily post in case you want to read about each day in more depth. [Click on the picture to go read all about that day.] Day 0/1 Flew from Atlanta to LaGuardia 911 Memorial Museum Brookwood Place Statue of Liberty Wall Street Little Italy Macy’s Day 2 Fox News Radio City Music Hall Rockefeller Center for the Christmas Spectacular St. Patrick’s Cathedral Day 3 Central Park Grand Central Station New York Public Library Bryant…

  • New York City - Trip Day 4
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    New York City Day 4

    May 31, 2019 - By 

    If you missed my first posts from our trip to New York at Christmas click —> New York City Day 1 New York City Day 2 New York City Day 3 Saturday, December 23rd Saturday was our last day in NYC and we hadn’t had bagels yet. So we stopped at Brown’s Bagels before getting on with our morning. Pretty good bagels, but they put a ton of cream cheese on their bagels and maybe that’s the way they prefer it up there. However, all of us ended up scraping half of the cream cheese off because it was too…

  • NYC Day 3
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    New York City Day 3

    May 28, 2019 - By 

    If you missed my first 2 posts about our trip to New York at Christmas click —> New York City Day 1 New York City Day 2 Saturday, December 22nd Saturday after finishing off the eggs and bacon we headed out towards Central Park. The night before we had walked a little bit of it in the dark, so I was happy to get to explore it in the day light. This street performer was unique and attracted quite a few onlookers. Although, I’m not sure he made much money. The bubbles he made with the rope were huge. I…

  • New York City Day 2
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    New York City Day 2

    May 21, 2019 - By 

    If you missed my first post about our 1st Day in New York at Christmas click —> New York City Day 1 Friday, December 21st Friday morning started off early as we wanted to get down to 1211 Avenue of the Americas to see if the hosts of Fox News Show Fox and Friends would come out and talk to us. However, it was a dreary day and rain was in the forecast. We got there and it started drizzling and then it started raining harder, but we stood there for over an hour or maybe it was 2. We…

  • New York City - Day 1
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    New York City Day 1

    April 18, 2019 - By 

    Over Christmas Break we went to New York City. This post covers the evening that we got there as well as our first full day. Wednesday, December 19th As soon as Alex got out of school, we booked it to Atlanta with a quick stop in Valley for lunch at Zen House. Our flight left at 5:50pm Eastern Time. Going through security went fast and we had time to kill, so we made our way to the international terminal and then made our way back in time to board our flight. We arrived at Laguardia at 10:50pm. We grabbed our…

  • Spring Training 2019
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    Spring Training 2019

    March 24, 2019 - By 

    For the last several years we have used our Spring Break to travel down to Florida to watch baseball during the Spring Training Season. Each year we try to see different ballparks as well as visit Rob’s Grandparents. The first Saturday of Spring Break, we got up at 3:30am and hit the road on our way to Lakeland, FL. We had a 1:00 game to get to at Joker Marchant Stadium, home of the Detroit Tigers. Detroit Tigers Joker Marchant Stadium Braves vs. Tigers (Lakeland) Home of the Tigers since 1966 Game Time: 1:05pm Opened: 1966 Renovated: 2017 Capacity: 9,000…

  • Travel

    Sight-seeing in D.C. Day 2

    February 15, 2019 - By 

    Here is the last post for our time in Washington, DC. Metro ride to start off the morning. Riding the elevator inside the Metro station Walking from the Metro to the Air and Space Museum Long line at the Museum that Sunday morning, but it went fast. I really enjoyed going to this museum mainly because my Grandparents took me here when we did our DC trip. However, the boys weren’t huge fans of the place and if I would have thought of it sooner we would have left and gone to the National Museum of American History instead. Live…

  • Site-Seeing Washington, DC
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    Sight-seeing in D.C. Day 1

    February 2, 2019 - By 

    Continuing my posts from our D.C. trip. If you missed the last post about this trip you can click: SAAM & National Portrait Gallery DC After a good breakfast at the hotel, we took the Metro to Arlington Cemetery. This place gets me every time. Just the sheer number of white marble headstones is breathtaking. If you decide to visit Arlington Cemetery, be prepared to go through security similar to airport security to enter. We were there early so the line wasn’t long. We followed the signs first to the Kennedy Memorial. The Kennedy Memorial and burial site for John…

  • Naval Academy & National's Game
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    Naval Academy & National’s Game

    November 16, 2018 - By 

    Here’s the next post about our DC trip. So if you remember from the last post, our boys flew in on Thursday night. Friday morning we got up, checked out of the Gaylord, and headed towards Annapolis, MD. We got into Annapolis, parked just outside of the Naval Academy, and made our way through security. We were in contact with Joe, Drew’s best friend (who you may remember from here or here) as he is a midshipmen at the Naval Academy. We seemed to get there just as class was letting out and we were able to meet up with…

  • Smithsonian American Art Museum & National Portrait Gallery - D.C.
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    SAAM & National Portrait Gallery – D.C.

    October 18, 2018 - By 

    My last day of being on my own before Rob was done with his conference and the kids flew into join us, I had decided I wanted to check out the Smithsonian American Art Museum (SAAM) & National Portrait Gallery (NPG). I took the Metro in and after a short walk from the Archives-Navy Memorial-Penn Quarter Station Metro stop, I was there. This museum is massive. Somehow I didn’t get a map when I went in, but I managed to see everything I wanted to see and more. Half of the building the SAAM and the other half is the…

  • Afternoon in Washington, DC
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    Afternoon in Washington, DC

    October 2, 2018 - By 

    Here’s another post from our trip to DC. After having lunch with Rob and some folks from the conference back at the Gaylord, I made my way over to the metro station. I decided on using the Anacostia, because it was going to be cheaper and faster than the one closest to National Harbor. However, what I wasn’t aware of was that parking is not where the actual station is that shows up on the map. So after nervously figuring out that situation with some help from the Metro employees, I made my way on to the correct train and…

  • Morning in Old Town Alexandria, VA
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    Morning in Old Town Alexandria, VA

    September 27, 2018 - By 

    Today I’m continuing my posts from our DC Trip. Rob’s first full day at the conference, I decided to do something that wasn’t on my list of must does so that I could get back to the hotel for lunch (since it was included in the guest fee that we paid.) I drove over to Old Town Alexandria, VA. I didn’t have anything specific I wanted to see or do, but you know I just enjoy driving to a place, walking around, taking pictures, and exploring. I’ve always heard that Old Town Alexandria is such a lovely place so I…

  • Travel

    Fun Day in National Harbor, MD

    August 28, 2018 - By 

    It’s been awhile since I’ve talked about our Boston to Washington Trip. Here’s the last post in case you missed it: Philly to Maryland So Day 4, we woke up in our hotel that we stayed in for the next several days, the National Harbor Gaylord Hotel, which is where Rob’s work conference was being held. He had a meeting that morning and since I didn’t think I’d have enough time to go out and come back and meet him for lunch. I made the decision to just walk around the Gaylord and relax. Inside the atrium area of the…

  • Travel

    Long Weekend in Louisiana

    August 14, 2018 - By 

    Rob’s sister, Shawna, from Nevada was in Baton Rouge recently and since we haven’t seen her in 14 years, we knew we had to go for a visit. Our new favorite place to stop on the way to Baton Rouge is The Boiling Pot. Drew and I got the Shrimp & Grits. I had Gumbo and Broccoli Cheese rice as my sides. Rob and Alex got the Shrimp Po’Boys. Anyway, so when we go to Baton Rouge, we usually stay with Rob’s cousin’s house; the Lindsey’s. Their 2nd oldest son, Cameron, is about the same age as Alex so they…

  • Vacationing in the Mountains of North Carolina
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    Vacationing in the North Carolina Mountains

    August 10, 2018 - By 

    Mountains, waterfalls, and serene views were calling our names for 4th of July this year. You may recall that we had an annual 4th of July mountain trip tradition going for a while (2010 2011 2012 2013), but we have done other things the last few years. Saturday We got up early Saturday morning, hit D Square donuts on our way out of town for a little sugar, and then got on the road. Our first planned stop was Tallulah Gorge, but we saw signs for great views at the Tallulah Point Overlook, which is basically a tourist trap. They…

  • Hiking Smith Mountain - Jacksons' Gap, AL
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    Smith Mountain – Jacksons’ Gap, AL

    July 24, 2018 - By 

    Sunday before Memorial Day we went over to Lake Martin (Dadeville, AL). Our usual tradition of camping at the lake with our friends got derailed mainly due to weather. However, Sunday turned out to be a hot sunny day. It’s crazy that as many times as we’ve been to Lake Martin, we had actually never been to Smith Mountain. There’s a .8 mile loop from a parking lot to the fire tower and back. Once you get up to the tower there are some beautiful views even if you don’t go up the tower. After hiking back down, we stopped…

  • Alabama Bucket List
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    Alabama Bucket List

    July 20, 2018 - By 

    Many travel lovers are always looking where to go next. So often we don’t stop and think about traveling our own state. Each state is unique and has good stuff to offer. I know my state of Alabama is rich in history and technology; from the Edmund Pettus Bridge to the US Space and Rocket Center. It also not lacking in beautiful landscapes from falls to state parks. I’ve gathered up a list of 50+ things (hopefully I didn’t duplicate any of them.) What are your must do’s in Alabama? Did I leave anything off? Nocculula Falls Fort Gaines Monte…

  • Heading to Maryland
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    Philly to National Harbor – Headed to Maryland

    June 26, 2018 - By 

    After spending the morning in Philly, we headed towards Baltimore, MD, but we had a couple planned stops along the way. One of our goals during our commute from Boston to D.C. was to drive through as many states as we could and see as many capitols as we could. Here’s the route we took. As you can see in the map above, we went a little bit out of the way to hit the Delaware capital, Dover. This is William V. Roth, Jr. Bridge in Delaware going over the Chesapeake & Delaware Canal that we passed along the way.…

  • 24 hours in Philly
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    24 hours in Philly

    June 12, 2018 - By 

    Today’s post covers my trip from Montville, NJ to Philadelphia, PA; our 2nd day of exploring from Boston down to DC. If you missed my first post from this trip, you can read about our day in Boston here: Day in Boston. First thing was first. We got up and drove from our hotel in Mahwah, NJ to Montville, NJ which wasn’t too far. The significance of stopping in Montville was to go see where Rob’s grandparents lived back when he was a toddler. This is their house now: Then we thought it would be good to have breakfast at…