Today I visited the second sister that I VT.  I walked again today, just like yesterday.  I didn't find anything interesting to photograph.  And the total distance today was, 0.06 miles.  Yep, 2 houses down and across the street.  So, since that was so boring I thought I'd share a few pictures with you - We went to Florida for Christmas and got to spend time with Celynda, Brian and family!

 Little Joslyn......
                And I do NOT know what Allan was doing in this photo......

 The guys activities while on the beach

                                                                        The girls activities.....

Super cute couple!

Allan and Shannon 

Lukas and Brookie trying to do the same....

 Okay, this was so funny.  There were these squirrels that would come down from the tree and grab food right out of your hand but you had to lay super still for them to come. Luke, Brook and Roxy were all laying there and Celynda came and put baby Joslyn there just for the picture!  It was too funny.  If you look close you can see the squirrel coming down but never came too close with all the kids together. Eventually, all of the kids, even Shannon and Allan, had a piece of food taken from them by the squirrels.

This is one of our family Christmas photos. We are still working on a Family Newsletter but we are now aiming for Valentine's Day.

Today I went walking - wait, what? You went where? doing what?  Yep.  I had a Visiting Teaching appointment and I knew it wasn't that far, so I decided to walk.  I took my phone for 'just in case'.

And guess what I found......yes, I can see that is NOT a natural heart - but what they heck!  A heart, in the gutter, as I walk to my VT lady!  What a fun surprise. And the walk was a little bit more than I had thought....1.7 miles.  But I need to start sometime to get back into walking or riding my bike.  I have a trip planned for NY soon and since we can't afford a car rental (the hotel 'parking' fee is $50 night!!!), we will be doing a LOT of walking to the sites. We seemed to have gotten a pretty centrally located hotel and the furthest thing from us will be the Statue of Liberty, so we might splurge on a taxi for that outing. Other sites we want to see......Mood Fabrics.....yep! the famed material store of Project Runway!  And I'll only have $100 for a 30 minute shopping spree! (ha ha). Also, Central Park, Manhattan Temple, Empire State Building, Trump Tower, Times Square, Kleinfeld wedding dress shop! And we are about 4 blocks from the Theater District....not that we can afford a show, but maybe they have rehearsals you can sit in on!  So, today was the beginning of a walking regimine to get me ready for walking in the cold and icy NY sidewalks!

I'm a pinterester....?  is that what I'd be called?  I'm not sure. Maybe if I break it down into categories I do understand, I can figure it out.   If I live in Arizona, I'm an Arizonian.  Does that makes me a pinterestian.  I live in the city of Mesa and we are called Mesans.  So, maybe I'm a pinterestan.  If my lineage comes from Israel...I'd be a Israelite....right?  So, could I be called a pinterestite?  Or an pinterestaholic....um, pinterestess.....pinterestologer?

I'm confused with what I am, so I'll just say I LOVE PINTEREST!  

Today instead of pinning -.......um, okay.  I think I already did some 'looking' this morning and possibly some 'pinning' - but after I did that, I decided to finish a project from my 'Crafts To Do' board that I had started a while back.

  Open this link for the original pin.

http://www.pinterest.com/pin/92042386105708827/

As you can see I wanted a blue umbrella.  My color preference.  I used water color pencils!  Have you ever used them?  They are really amazing.  Water color pencils rock!

Anyway, this was my 'wasted time' project for today.  At least when hubby asks what I did all day, I'll have something to show him!   I'm not in love with it, but it was fun and I'll be doing more!

I can't believe it's been January that I've posted!  It's not that my life has been 'unbusy' - just the opposite!  And I noticed in my last post it said "Washington - part 1".  Well, I can't seem to find the part two pictures and videos I will put on someday, but for today you get a few picture recaps of the Mesa High School's wonderful play; Hello, Dolly.  Really an outstanding play put on by the kids and drama faculty!

Washington DC Trip - part 1

I'll try to make this brief, but sadly, it might not be.  For Shannon and Allan's Christmas gift, we decided to go somewhere instead of buying them things that were not needed.....games/clothes/etc.!  So on New Years Eve, we took a 1am flight to Washington DC, getting in there at 7am.  Crazy?  Yep.  

Arlington Cemetery.  This was a pretty impressive wax guy.  

Funny picture of the scout uniforms in 1922- See Allan, scouts even had flag duty back then!

It was really amazing to see all of the headstones.

It was SOOO cold!!!  I'm not joking!

One of the days we were here was so cold that they high was 22 degrees!!!!!

I took this picture as they were changing the guards and the other folks - all 5 of them, did not appreciate the little camera sound.

So guess what we Arizonans did when we saw ice on the ground -.....yep!...  Walk on it and break it!

After renting our car, went straight to the Cemetery and then that evening, although exhausted, we went to a play at the Kennedy Arts Center called; Shear Madness.  It has been running 24 years!!!  It was cute and we all enjoyed ourselves.  Kind of an interactive play where they ask the audience to participate with questions that they ask.  

After the play we drove to the Lincoln Memorial.  

And of course stepping out of the Lincoln Memorial we viewed the Washington Monument, which we found out the next day, that it was closed due to renovations from a small earthquake.  Hmm.....earthquake?  Should I be nervous.  Our hotel room is up pretty high.

And Allan found something funny to do.  Oops, he went the wrong way the first time.....he had to do it again of course!!!

See his gloves?  Those are texting gloves.....one of his pre-Christmas gifts.....to get him excited about the upcoming trip.

On Thursday, we got to go to the Washington DC Temple and do baptisms!  And the unique part is that they actually take you into THE temple and down a few hallways where there are some gorgeous paintings.  They explained that the kids, or those with just a baptism recommend, are interviewed and found worthy to be IN the temple and so they take them a new route that lets the kids see the beauty of the temple.  We were there with another family from Michigan.  It was nice.  When we first arrived you could not even see the spires. It was so foggy - really neat.  By the time we came out.....well, you can see for yourself....simply beautiful!

Tossing his hat

this is just a 'tease' picture for my next blog.