An excuse to make my coworkers like me

Last week my relief society had an enrichment activity on cake decorating, where I taught the basic of the basics group, thanks to my Wilton 101 class 3 months ago that I took with my cute friend Maren. Since everyone brought their own cake items to decorate and take home, there was no cake eating to be had at the activity, thus I was stuck with my round, layered, filled, and base-iced cake. My coworkers had long since heard of my cake decorating class months ago, since the days I had it I had to run out the door the second I was off or I would never make it. Ever since then, they have been begging me to bring one in. Lucky day for them, I had a cake on my hands and no one to give it to.

So I spent Monday evening getting patriotic and creative a la vez too wow my fellow career people with my skills. Simple, but fun. I think it was a hit, they were hilariously excited about it, and I haven't stopped hearing about it since. I might think about making a cake again sometime in the future when I break the news to them that I'm not planning on jumping on the maternity-leave-and-then-return train...

Date Night {temporarily redefined}

Since my cute friend Rachel and I found ourselves husband-less and car-less on a Friday night, she invited me out for a date night, and we had a fabulous evening. Despite the fact that it took us an hour to get going due to necessary bike tuning and other such preparations, we finally figured out the bike pump, said goodbye to the Merkleys (I can't believe you guys are gone!!), and we were off for an evening of pleasant neighborhood bike cruising on our stylin' wheels.

After admiring every quaint and perfectly desirable house that we of course cannot afford, we cruised over to 23rd Street to pick out our dinner spot for the evening. We decided on the perfect little Italian restaurant that I have been eying since my internship summer 2 years ago (due mostly to the flower boxes that I love hanging over the open candlelit windows). We may or may not have dined at the most romantic restaurant on the block. Fittingly, we split a fabulous appetizer and entree, chatted, and just so you know James and Jon, we did in fact talk about how much we love our husbands and how absolutely fun it is every day to be married to you. Thus the need to date others to fill in the gaping hole whilst you're both away! :)

I had so much fun Rache, we definitely have to do it again! How cute are we with the hip bicycle in front of the romantical restaurant??

Strawberry Pickin'

We've been wanting to go strawberry picking ever since Melissa got here last year but we didn't know where to go until Melissa saw pix on a friend's blog recently, so she asked her and we went as soon as we could.

Not only was this the hottest most humid day of the year, but it's the same day we ran the 5K (below) and went to Grant's baptism and the Potomac river (also below). So it was a busy day.

For those of you who want to pick your own strawberries, this place is called Miller Farms, and it's a 30 minute drive from Crystal City, south east of the District, in MD. We picked 8 lbs and it cost us $11, so it's a good deal and you can pick the perfect berries. They also serve homemade soft-serve ice cream in the little store, and a large is about a foot tall, and it's GOOD!

Potomac River

We had the privilege of attending Grant Croshaw's baptism at the Mount Vernon building, which was an incredible program filled with the spirit. Grant even shared his testimony at the meeting which was a simple and perfect testimony.

After the meeting Melissa and I walked down to the Potomac River (about 100 yards from the building), and as you can see in the first picture, Melissa tried jumping a muddy spot of lawn in her heals and didn't quite clear it, so we had even more reason to go right down to the water to wash off her shoes and feet. Melissa is very cute, but she needs to work on that long jump :)

The fishermen were really reeling them in that day, so we took some photos of them out on the water.

Seeing PINK, smelling B.O.

We ran in the Race for the Cure last weekend. A 5K which had 50,000 people in attendance and raised $4.9 million to fund breast cancer research and community health programs for the medically underserved in the National Capital Area. Melissa and I were honored to run along side our friend Julie Brady who's mom JUST beat breast cancer in the last couple months. Julie we think that's awesome, thanks for letting us run with you. We feel blessed to be able to do our tiny part in society.

As far as the race goes...This was the hottest, humidest day of the year, and with 50,000 people running side by side for 3 miles, the mob of runners was a big, slow, pack of sweaty, B.O. swappers. Yum. We never thought 12+ minute miles was possible in a 5K, but sure accomplished it. I'm pretty sure we didn't cross the starting line until about 15 minutes into the run. That's a lot of folks. Fun times in the "greenery and humid air".

Food Foiled by Flood

Let's just say the California Pizza Kitchen has a little problem with flooding, and during a big rain storm has more water inside the restaurant than outside.

So we were sitting at lunch with Rachel Watson and the Allens when a massive rainstorm ensued. Our table was right up against the wall of big glass window. Nobody believed me when I said I was getting wet, then I told everyone that we needed to move our table away from the window. I guess every was wondering why I was taking the joke as far as I was, apparently I was the only one being rained on. After we moved our table everyone could see that water was coming down inside of the wall of windows. We finally picked up all our food and moved to a new table, and pretty soon the entire wall of windows was a waterfall, all on the inside of the restaurant. Since we weren't in the flood anymore we had fun taking pictures of the waiters who were attempting to squeegee water into trays that they placed on the floor, it was a weird method and didn't really seem to work, but at least they were trying to do something. We managed to walk away with a 20 percent discount, but we all would have paid more for the entertainment.

Before going out to our car in the rain, we enjoyed Shilow's Guitar Hero faces at Best Buy. The boy has skills!

Rolling Thunder

Every Memorial Day weekend the Rolling Thunder biker club comes to town. We were lucky enough to stumble across them this year on the way back from kayaking in Georgetown.

Melissa managed to snap a photo of me in the middle of thousands of HOGs which captured a pretty fair amount of the excitement I get when I'm around these rumbling roadsters. This bike with 2 wheels on the front is a real beauty, as well as this yellow submarine, or whatever it is. We found this religious motif on painted on the back of a 3 wheeler. We saw plenty of handlebars that I wouldn't even be able to reach too, but didn't get any shots of them.

I'll probably never get a bike like any of these, but Melissa and I wouldn't mind stumbling across an inexpensive bike one day.

Kayaking the Potomac with the Morris's

Melissa and I hopped on our beach cruisers and biked on over to Georgetown with our good friends Ashlee and Nate where we rented Kayaks at Joe's (10 bucks per kayak per hour). The weather couldn't have been better, and when Melissa capsized she said the water was pretty nice too.

We weren't expecting the wildlife we saw. Ducks and swans, cool birds in the trees that came inches from crapping right on my mug, a lizard, and about 6 red eared slider turtles, just like Lincoln, but 2 or 3 times bigger, out basking on logs. It was a real treat to see Lincoln's cousins out in the wild. We said "Hi" to them for him (and he said "Hi" back).

Melissa didn't really capsize, I was just kidding. I tried tipping my kayak over and it was harder than I thought it would be. Never did it.

Air Show with the Essigs (and the Hulk)

Well, this was a great opportunity to watch planes, drive tanks, shoot guns, and grab buns. As you can see Ali took full advantage of that chance. And Ironman wasn't too happy either. He came up to us afterward and asked "Did you guys take incriminating pictures of my butt?" We denied everything. Little does he know I just posted those pictures on our blog. It turns out that the dudes go for guns and the ladies for buns, who knew?

As you can see we arrived on the tarmac with quite a welcome, our cheeks are still sore from smiling and waving to all our fan club. I was thankful for the hardy welcome because this was my first time ever going to an air show, we were enjoying ourselves so much we all forgot to eat. We finally grabbed some burgers and wieners as we left.

This post is a little late, much like all our other posts, Melissa and I have already peeled completely and burned our skin afresh since this long day out in the sun. We actually spent more time in line for the shuttle on the way there and then again on the way home than we did the entire time at the show, the line was a painful experience, but the show was worth the pain, it was fascinating.

Notice:

For those of you who like a little dose of verbiage with your photographic illustrations, the stories behind the pics have now been added to the most recent train of posts.