July 4th Adventures

Jeffrey came into town this past weekend! It was VERY refreshing to be able to see each other after the long month and a half of being apart.  It was also fun to finally be able to show him around Sterling and the surrounding area, where I grew up, all that fun stuff.
Jeffrey arrived on Saturday morning EARLY in the morning.  He had to take a red eye from Salt Lake to Long Beach, CA then on to Washington Dulles.  I know-what an obnoxious travel schedule, go west to get east-but it was really inexpensive which is hard to find in the DC area around the 4th of July.  So, my cute little fiance toughed it out and got here around 5:30 am on Saturday. That meant I had to get up early to go get him, but I didn't mind so much, especially because I couldn't sleep from excitement. :D
Meeting at the airport was a shock to the system, we both hadn't held someone's hand in so long it was weird for a few minutes until everything sunk back into place again.  I made him coupons for valentines day and one was a wild card, he used it when he got there and said to me "just don't let go."  I know....cheesy but I love my sweet boy. After retrieving his bag from baggage claim we got in the car to begin our adventure.
Both of us felt wide awake, so at 6 am I decided to take him on a driving tour of sterling before we headed back to my house.  We drove down Sterling Boulevard and he got to see Park View High School and other important landmarks.  Then we headed back and had some donuts for breakfast.  After an abbreviated house tour (since everyone was still asleep), and looking at pictures, we decided we were tired after all so we decided to take a nap before really beginning the day.
After well-needed sleep, Brooke and Zoey came over and we hung around the house for a while.  Then we headed over to Great Falls National Park-one of my favorite places in the world.  We wandered the trails and Jeff got to see the falls. We tried to wander a little closer to the water, which usually isn't an issue, but it didn't work so well.  We got to sit and observe the water from a closer distance for about 15 minutes before a park ranger came and shooed everyone back onto the trails.  We were confused at first because I always went closer to the water then the given trails, not super close, but closer then the park rangers had wanted us to leave.  We found out later that someone had drowned at great falls the day before, so security was really strict that day, especially with the number of people in the park since it was 4th of July weekend.  So, we moved on down the trail and found some rock climbers that we watched for a little while.  After that we headed back home to delicious pulled pork my mom had made.  She had asked me what Jeffrey's favorite foods were before he got there and she made almost all of them over the course of his stay-how spoiled! :D
The family then headed over to the Sterling Golf, Swim, and tennis club to hang out for a while before the fireworks.  We found our squatting ground and talked, played with the ipad, and ate cotton candy-who can pass up the pure sugary goodness of this delicacy? The fireworks were pretty good for local fireworks if you ask me-nothing compares to the nation's capitals fireworks though.  The Sterling fireworks did have a star shaped firework though which neither of us had ever seen-pretty cool if you ask me.  After that we headed home and I made Sunday dessert and Jeffrey finished the night by watching the Twilight Zone with my family-a nightly tradition my dad started-I'm not sure if he wants to marry into my family anymore after that. Only kidding...
Sunday was fast Sunday which was a little rough with having to finish the dessert but I made it through alive.  We attended the first 2 hours of the singles ward and Jeffrey got to meet my Bishop.  It was fast and testimony meeting and Jeffrey was having some trouble staying awake because of his red eye flight and jet lag.  Well, Bishop Axleguard got up and started to bare his testimony.  He said, "I had the pleasure of meeting Jeffrey Curtis this morning..." and continued to talk about Jeff and I and our upcoming wedding. I had to squeeze Jeff's arm to wake him up since the bishop was calling him out from the stand.  I feel bad because he was just so sleepy, and my mom had encouraged him to sleep through church (my dad's really good at doing that...).  I guess that's what happens when you sleep through church! I have to say, it was pretty fun looking back on it though.  We attended the temple prep class which started that day then left before the third hour so we could make it to the temple and back before family dinner.
So, we got on the road to get to the temple.  Jeff had seen pictures from 495 that the temple spires come up over the trees and was disappointed when he didn't see it before we exited the highway.  We got there and he saw it, and it was overwhelming to be there together.  It made the whole marriage in a month and a half thing seem MUCH more real.  We checked out the visitors center then took a leisurely walk around the outside of the temple and the grounds and took some pictures. I told Jeffrey as we gazed at the temple that this was our castle, he told me he would remind me I said that too him one day-I hope he does.
After the temple we came home to another delicious family dinner-Navajo Tacos (another Jeffrey request).  My whole family-brothers, sisters, in-laws all made it to family dinner which was really fun since Jeffrey got to meet everyone.  After we ate, we played games as a family (pandemic, farkle, skip-bo, the works).  After the brain work-out of some of those games we decided we couldn't take anymore and sat down to talk.  Jeff then asked for embarassing pictures of me but instead he got home videos.  He got to see the all too famous video of me putting a bag on my head and running into a wall when I was about 2 years old.  He thought he was marrying someone smart...little did he know! Ha! We spent a long time that night going through old family videos and it was really quite fun.  After a few hours we called it quits and went to bed.
The next morning was an early one, we had to get up to go the annual 4th of July breakfast at the church.  Jeff got to meet some of the members of my home ward that my family is close too which was...interesting for him-only kidding! After the breakfast we came home and got ready for the day and packed lunch for our DC adventures that were soon to come.  After we got all ready to go we headed to the metro and took the metro into the city.  Jeff ended up leading us around the city to the museums even though I had been there time and time again throughout my life-I'm notoriously bad wit directions.
We went to the American History museum first which was PACKED.  All the museums were pretty busy but the American History museum was by far the worst.  We went through security and as Jeff had the backpack checked the security guard said to him- "Aren't you supposed to be at a barbecue or something?"-The back pack was full of snacks and dinner for our picnic later.  It was pretty funny.  At the American History museum Jeff got to see the star-spangled banner, dorothy's slippers, cat-woman's suit, the first ladies dresses and more.  Unfortunately the LDS sun stone had gone into storage and wasn't at the museum though.  We then headed over to the Natural history museum and saw the Hope diamond (biggest diamond ever) and some other impressive jewelry along with dinosaurs and other fossils.  Our last museum stop was the Air and Space museum where Jeff got to walk through a spaceship and experience freeze-dried ice cream for the first time.  He asked "do we need to wait until we're home to get the amount of water right?"  Little did he know you eat it as is...
After all those adventures we headed over to the mall security to go meet Brooke and Scott.  They saved us great seats for the fireworks show that evening.  It took a while to get through security but that's too be expected.  We found another funny security guy as jeffrey got the backpack checked, he said "she packs it, you carry it, right?" I was afraid that Jeff was going to have to be wanded when we went through security though because they were wanding all the guys wearing cargo shorts-Jeff has a piece of metal from a broken bone right where his pocket is-luckily we dodged that bullet.  We met up with Brooke and Scott and had our picnic and hung out until the fireworks started.  They were AMAZING.  Jeff turned to me as we were watching and said -"These are the biggest fireworks I have EVER seen."  After the fireworks ended and we were packing up our things, it started to rain ash on us because we were so close to the action!  We headed to the metro and it was actually suprisingly easy to get home.  Usually it takes forever and the crowds are huge but they opened a new train right when we got in the station so we got a seat and everything.  It was a long day and we were VERY tired by the end but it was super fun.
Tuesday morning was take care of business day.  We ordered Jeff's wedding ring, ordered the catering, and took care of some wedding things.  Not a very exciting day but necessecary.  We then went and saw Brooke and Scott's house and Jeff practiced driving the stick-shift car.  After all that we headed over to the Sterling pool for a relaxing afternoon. We then came home, ate dinner, caught fireflies-Jeff had never caught one before, and had a campfire in our backyard to roast marshmallows.  A less busy, but also fun day.
On Wednesday we were so pooped from the week we just spent the morning hanging out playing games and watching movies instead of going to the Zoo like we had planned.  Then Wednesday afternoon we went to 5-Below and the dollar store with Trevor.  Both random stores but we had a good time. Trevor bought a kite that ended up having a flying horse (like a unicorn with out a horn) on it.  Jeff named it the nemesis Pegasus to make it seem less girly.  We all had a good laugh over it.  On Wednesday night we ventured back into the city so Jeff could see all the monuments.  My dad is quite the tour guide and knows as much about those monuments as a lot of the park rangers do.  The weather actually wasn't to bad and Jeff got to see all the rest of the sights.  It was a great end to a great trip.
Thursday morning we just got up and headed off to the airport-then it was back to reality for the both of us. Only 33 days until we're reunited again and 42 until we're married.
Pictures of our adventures will be coming soon-they're on Jeff's camera so hopefully I'll get them soon.
Until next time-we love you.
Chelsea & Jeffrey