Philadelphia

Every year Sara, Amanda, Marie, and I go somewhere fun for a girls' weekend. We almost missed our chance this year as Amanda is especially busy with her MBA program, but we managed to pull together an excellent weekend on the East Coast and visited Philadelphia.

Our first stop, of course, was to find a good cheesesteak. While the sandwich rivalry between Pat's and Gino's is fun, we eventually found a better cheesesteak inside Reading Terminal Market at a place called Carmen's.

11-6-15

We also took a walk around the city at night and enjoyed this fountain, representing the three waterways in Philly, the LOVE statue, and the city hall.

City Hall

LOVE

We stayed right across the street from the Reading Terminal Market, which is filled with vendors of all kinds selling fresh, delicious foods. We made a big mistake waiting until Sunday to try to purchase an Amish donut. The Amish, obviously, don't work on Sundays. :(

Reading Terminal Market

The next day we visited the historic downtown and saw the Liberty Bell and Independence Hall before it started raining. We then decided to hop on a covered bus to see the rest of the city.

A pretty awesome group. Photo Credit: Some lady with Marie's camera

Independence Hall

Marie and I ran up the Art Museum steps, Rocky-style.

The "AMOR" statue is the clear winner in terms of aesthetics and location. I was underwhelmed by "LOVE".

Rocky

Enjoying the town by bus.

Rodin Museum

My favorite part of the weekend was probably high tea at the Rittenhouse Hotel. Having tea is something we finally acknowledged is an indispensable girls' weekend tradition, seeing as the majority of the group have had tea in DC, Denver, San Francisco, and now Philadelphia together.

Sara & Amanda

Marie & I

Dessert

On Sunday, we toured the Eastern State Penitentiary ruins. It looks like a castle, but it's really an old, creepy jail that drove people into insanity. What could be better? This was an excellent tour.

The incarceration rate in the US from 1900 to today.

Al Capone's cell

Amazing! I always have fun with these gals. Thanks for another great weekend!

Gadsby's Tavern Museum

If we weren't already spoiled by all the free museums in the area, one Saturday in September the rest of our museums become free for Smithsonian's Museum Day Live! event. That day was yesterday and we like to take advantage of it to see something we've never seen before.

9-26-15 - The girls listen intently during their museum tour.

This year, we went to Old Town Alexandria and toured Gadsby's Tavern Museum. Gadsby's is an old tavern and hotel built in 1785 which was attached to a restaurant where George Washington used to celebrate his birthday and other events. You can still go to the restaurant and order George Washington's favorite dish (glazed duck -- which is delicious), but we'd never been in the museum before. It included a short tour (which was perfect for the kids) with a mocked up typical tavern room, a pair of ballrooms, and an example of a guest bedroom (without a bathroom, of course).

What a tavern was like in 1785.

Original flooring and decor. The girls are posing with their make-believe lanterns, which were carried throughout the tour.

An Old Piano

This featherbed was luxurious at the time.

Music balcony includes a "door to nowhere". If you leave through that door, you must jump half a story to get down into the hallway.

After the tour, we bought some heritage chocolate, which we enjoyed in front of the Alexandria City Hall after a walk through the Farmer's Market and lunch.

It's always fun to discover new things in our own backyard and it's especially fun to do it for free!

The Book of Mormon

My mom, of all people, is a big fan of The Book of Mormon. I gave her a ticket to see it in Chicago last year for Christmas, but I still hadn't seen it. Last year it came to the Kennedy Center in DC and tickets were going for $300-$600. Luckily, I am very patient, so when it came back to the Kennedy Center again, my mom and I decided to go. I'm glad I did. I'm not sure how Trey Parker, Robert Lopez, and Matt Stone did it, but they've invented something that is at the same time hilarious, offensive, and still allows you to walk away thinking all Mormons are actually really great. We had a fantastic time and it was really special seeing it with my mom. Thanks for coming with me, Mom!

7-3-15 - Me & Mom

Pre-Show Photo Op on the Kennedy Center Balcony

Illegal Stage Photo

Illegal Ceiling Photo

Make sure you ask my mom about her ceiling photo.

Vegas

It took me 31 years to visit Las Vegas for the first time, but in the past year I've gone twice. I was highly skeptical that I'd have a good time both times, but it turns out that Vegas was one of the highlights of this trip.

We spent our 10th wedding anniversary in Vegas and decided to do a couple special things. First, we ate dinner in the fanciest (and most expensive) restaurant we've ever been to, the Eiffle Tower Restaurant overlooking the Bellagio fountain across the street.

5-29-15 - "Paris"

The views were nice, but the food was AMAZING. I had a lobster salad, a delicious apple cocktail, and duck with potatoes au gratin. Nathan had the filet mignon with spinach and mushrooms. Everything was perfect.

Our View

For dessert, I ordered the chocolate plate, which was delicious, but Nathan ordered the Meringue dish, which was so good, it literally melted in your mouth.

This is the only photo we took together on our actual anniversary.

After dinner, we went to see the Cirque du Soleil show, "O", which is the one with the pool in the middle of the stage. That was also amazing. We capped off the night with about three hours of gambling during which Nathan won $2.93, then happily stopped. I lost $65 that night, then won it all back in a lucky Craps game the next morning. What can I say, the dice love me.

We stayed the night at the Mirage and spent the morning eating delicious pancakes, by the pool and playing craps. It was a fun, but expensive night. One night in Las Vegas is about all I can handle. I think I'd either get bored or become poor if I stayed longer.

We flew back to Milwaukee to pick up the kids and on the way back to DC, our plane was diverted to Pittsburgh, where Southwest marooned us for the night. Instead of hanging around, we jumped in a car at 10pm and rode the 4.5 hours back home, arriving at 2:30am. The kids did pretty well in the back seat of our Chevy Malibu.

All-in-all, Utah and Vegas was an incredible trip. I'm glad we left the kids home for this one, but there's no reason they can't come next time. I'm sure we'll be back again really soon.

Lake Mead

On May 29, our anniversary, we spent the night in Las Vegas before taking a flight back to Milwaukee. On our way back to Vegas, we had some time to kill, so we drove through Lake Mead National Recreation Area, then stopped to see the Hoover Dam. The scenery included these crazy rocks:

Plus a good opportunity to take some gorgeous photos!

As we both expected, the Hoover Dam was underwhelming, but now we can claim that we've seen it.

Check out how low the water is. It was over 100 degrees as we were touring the dam, so we quickly decided to depart and head to Las Vegas instead!