Dear Monday...

Dear work...THANK YOU for having one of the best seats in town. I
got to go on the rooftop of your pretty building and did not regret it. 

Dear Surprise Cookies...I want to make you ASAP but pinned you because it will have to wait.

Dear Bailey...thank you for the prettiest birthday flowers ever! I love them so much and am
so glad they sent me another vase and bouquet since my first vase broke. More flowers for me! 

Dear Kyle...thank you for always being so much fun and making me laugh. I love that when I was taking
pictures of the flowers all I heard was "watch out for the broom!" and caught this gem of a picture. 

Dear National Building Museum...you are so cool! Thanks for hosting a
neat dinner that my work invited us to so we can admire your tall pillars.

Dear work...thanks for inviting me and Kyle to a snazzy dinner at the National History Museum so we could drink out of fun glasses and enjoy good food. 

Dear Rifle Paper Co...you make the cutest book covers! Why, oh why, do I have to wait to buy them all?! 

Dear Kyle...I hope we have 5 littles that look exactly like you
when you were little. Also, I love all your sisters. Beauties. 

Dear Kyle's great great grandmother Etta...I love your name and want to name one of our littles after you. Also, I can't wait to meet you and hear what it was like for you when you were our age. 

A Day At the Zoo

I LOVE the National Zoo. Kyle knows this too and so he planned a scavenger hunt for me using our favorite miniature animals. We also had lunch at our all time favorite sandwich shop, Jetties. It was a good day to be out and about with the animals. 

I LOVED the otters. They kept swimming up against me where I was standing
and doing back flips. I secretly wish I could have read their thoughts.

I spy a cheetah...

This tiger was SO cool! He spent a good five minutes trying to fish a big plastic barrel out of the water and we watched the whole time. By the time he did, everyone cheered and he kind of looked up confused at us wondering what the big deal was. Such a beautiful animal. 

We loved our day at the zoo!

In Honor of Freedom

To celebrate Kyle's new job, we went out on September 11 to have dinner at Ted's Bulletin on the hill and to see The Spirit of America, a musical presentation put on by soldiers who reenact moments in history. It also had musical numbers by soldiers in The U.S. Army Band "Pershing's Own". It was nice to go to something patriotic on September 11 and remember the freedoms we have and those who fought and continue to fight for these freedoms. 

Ted's Bulletin is known for their homemade pop tarts. 

One of the best sloppy joes I've ever had. 

Celebration calls for peanut butter chocolate shakes.

We finished up the night with our favorite gelato spot, Pitango. We never regret stopping by here.

On Top of Old Smoky

For labor day weekend, we took a trip down to Great Smoky Mountains National Park in North Carolina with some friends. All I could think was "no wonder it's called Great Smoky". Drifts of fog would roll in and out through the hills and we felt like we were right in the middle of a scene from The Last of the Mohicans. We loved getting away for the weekend and marking another national park off the list.

We stayed in a fun cabin that was surrounded by trees.

Beautiful foggy sunsets. 

We took turns on meals and this was a taco salad by our friend Lucy that was SO good. 

It was over this weekend that I decided I would run a Ragnar Race (I have no idea why...) so Kyle and I went on a little train run to continue my training. I loved running through the mist with him cheering me on because runs like this are a walk in the park for him.

Smoky, no?

We went on a lot of fun hikes including one to a waterfall that has had better days (moving into the fall, I think it had started to die off).

Our friends Jake and Sierra have the cutest baby named Sloan. This is what he does when they say 'show us your muscles'. 

Cute Benson.

Kyle found a vine and tried to see how far he could climb before he got too tired or it gave way. Luckily he got too tired first because I'm not sure what would have happened if it broke.

We got caught in a crazy rainstorm and had to wait with the littles while the guys rain back to get the cars.

I get so excited when Kyle plays with our friend's kids because I see what he'll be like as a dad.

The ultimate selfie. 

One of our friends was making pancakes for breakfast and I gave him the assignment of making a Sasquatch shaped one. I think he did pretty well.

The area was full of green fields and barns.

We finished our stay by visiting Upper Creek Falls to do some rope swinging and rock sliding. 

This rock slide was the coolest thing. You just sat down
and the current picked you up and threw you on down. 

There were some people there with the cutest dog and one dog
started sliding down on accident so Kyle jumped in to save him. 

We LOVED Great Smoky Mountain National Park and
hope to return soon while we are out on the east coast!