Our First Week in Philadelphia

So, our first week in Philadelphia has been pretty perfect. And prepare yourself, this is going to be a long post. From here on out I plan to post much more frequently so these long posts don't have to happen!

Glen and I have done fun stuff almost every day.  But I took a lot of pictures on our drive to Pennsylvania, so I will post those here as well. By the way, the drive was BEAUTIFUL. After living in Texas during a drought, the trees were looking extraordinarily green the whole drive and I could not stop staring. Breathtaking. Anyway, my favorite part of the entire trip was this:

We were driving on the freeway, and out of nowhere (seemingly) we see the beautiful spires of the Washington D.C. LDS Temple. We had no idea it was coming, and I had never even seen it before. Even though we only saw the very top, it was so cool and I can't describe how happy it made me feel.

The last couple nights in our Austin apartment were busy, to say the least. After Glen finished his last final, we had 2 days to finish packing up. This is what it looked like:

Thanks to some of our friends in our ward and the missionaries, we were able to get all this into a storage unit for the summer while we're away. Now for the drive. Before our trip, I had visited 15 states in my lifetime, mostly the ones on the West Coast, and a couple of them when I was too young to remember. By the time we had arrived, I had been been in 21, and 22 after we decided to drive to New Jersey and back just for fun :). I got most of the state welcome signs, with the exception of Arkansas.

And this one, taken a little later that week:

Day 1: We arrived at our apartment. We LOVE it. So, let me try to explain how this works. We are renting a room from a lady who owns a 4 story town home. She lives alone and is currently renting out 2 other rooms. So our room mates are Joan, our 53 year old renter who walks dogs for a living (and makes bank doing it! She says she'll make 6 figures this year!), Igor, the Russian med student who is barely ever home because he studies so much, and Mika, a really cool black girl who has an awesome little dog named Buttercup. We don't know her too well yet.

When we tell some people what our living situation is like, they think we're crazy. But we love it so much. There is plenty of room and it's nice to have people around.

So, the layout of the house goes like this:

First floor is connected to the garage, and Mika's bedroom.

Second floor is the Kitchen (which is very large), and the family room with a big screen TV.

Third floor has the laundry room, my and Glen's room and bathroom, and Igor's room and bathroom.

Fourth floor is all Joan's, like a mini apartment.

If' I've learned anything about housing in downtown Philadelphia, it's that the houses/apartments look tiny on the outside, but are huge on the inside. This is ours:

Our room is that third floor, with those 3 windows at the top. I don't have pictures of the rest of the house yet, but here are some pictures of our room:

My sink 

Glen's sink 

This is looking across the street from our front door: 

And down the street. That's Glen walking to our car. 

I just can't get over all the houses all next to each other like that, and the roads are mostly all one-way and soo small. This one is pretty wide but there are a lot that are soooo tiny.

We signed me up for a gym membership here, it's really close to our place. 

Then Glen and I drove around and just took a lot of pictures because everything seemed so cool to me! 

This is the Delaware River/Bay that separates us from New Jersey. It is right down the street from us.

Benjamin Franklin Bridge that connects us to New Jersey: 

There are a lot of these really old tunnels: 

This is where Glen's Law firm is, which occupies floors 19-24 I believe: 

And Glen's Office: 

Don't mind us, we just drove for 30 hours prior to this picture: 

REAL grass! It's so soft! Not like the coarse Texas grass. 

'

Look what we happened upon!! 

Day 2: Happy Birthday Glen! It was also his first day at work. Sorry, no pictures on this day.

Day 3: Philly Cheese Steak day! Glen and I decided we could delay this no longer. We researched the Philly Cheese Steak places in the area and decided to try this one first, as it was in walking distance from us:

Okay, so the name isn't all that appetizing but still, it got great reviews. 

The reviews were accurate. They were delicious! Glen and I then went to get library cards. In Philadelphia they have what's called "The Free Library of Philadelphia" which consists of 52 branches throughout the city. This is our dinky little branch:

Day 5: After I picked up Glen for work we parked and went for a walk downtown. We found this little Pizza shop and thought we'd give it a try. We got 2 giant pieces of pizza plus a drink for $5. Not bad for Philadelphia. We can't wait to return!

The Franklin Institute 

We then decided we would walk down to the largest branch of the Free Library of Philadelphia. It is a old, large building that was just so neat. 

Day 6: I picked up Glen from work and we headed to the Philadelphia Pretzel Factory for some pretzels right before we took off to head to Harrisburg for the weekend to visit Glen's Brother and his family.

Day 7: We were with Brant, Coralee, Annie, and Baby Mabel. In the morning Glen and his brother Brant went and played basketball at the church. When they returned Coralee and I decided to go for a run, and Glen came along. The houses in the area were so cute, and everyone in the town was really nice and would say hi to us as we ran by. Glen and I babysat the girls later on while Brant and Coralee went to a baptism, and we had fun playing in the water with Annie. Later we went to the city Hershey, and visited Chocolate World, the non-amusement park side of Hershey Land, and learned how Hershey's chocolate is made. We had a lot of fun there! When we came home we played some baseball with Annie, had a cookout, played croquet, and then some games later on.

And this is probably the coolest picture I have ever taken. Annie hits the ball and Memphis catches it in his mouth and I got a picture of it! 

I should note that Annie dresses herself and these are her favorite "pants." Coralee tells me that they try to explain to her that they aren't pants, but Annie doesn't seem to care. She is so cute. 

Day 8: We attended church with Brant and Coralee, which happened to be in the same building that Glen often visited on his mission! This is where he gave his farewell talk as a missionary. Coincidentally, the subject of sacrament meeting was serving missions, and a return missionary spoke as well as one of the missionaries currently serving in the ward.

Glen teaches Annie how to play "Cut the Rope," a game he has on his Android. She quickly fell in love with it and was actually quite good. 

We also had a fun time playing some great games later that evening. 

And for some reason, we had a really fun time trying to blow out a candle that was really far away. 

Day 9: This was Memorial Day. Coralee and I started out with a run, and we were surprised to see a full parade crossing one of the streets where we ran! It was a pleasant surprise, and we enjoyed the nice patriotic feel of it, and a break from running. We played in the water a little more, went to lunch, went thrifting, and had another BBQ. It was a perfect day.

Having trouble lighting the coals... it had rained earlier that day. 

Overall, Glen and I have really been enjoying ourselves. We can't wait to see what else the summer holds for us. That's it for now! Hopefully you will be hearing from me soon!