Clara's first Phillies game

Even though we only had 2 weeks to prepare for our move after our return from France, we decided to go ahead and enjoy 1 last Phillies game before we went.

Crab fries

Mmmmmm

skyline

Baby did fall asleep a few times during the game, but wasn't able to stay asleep for too long because it was noisy.

Wow, it was a gorgeous night for some baseball

sleepy girl

We made it all the way through the game, and the Phillies actually kicked butt.  It wasn't their best season, so it was fun to see them win.  We're so happy we made time for that before we moved.

Our last day in P1

We sure love the Philadelphia 1st Ward, and were so sad to leave it.  On our last Sunday there, we snapped some pictures to help us remember.

We liked to sit in the back of the chapel, especially after we had the baby

Zack showing off his awesome selfie skills again with Rudolph Obey

Quilly, Clara's adopted grandpa

Pat, the RS president

Zakpah

Mary, Clara's adopted grandma 

Zakpah was so kind to me when I was pregnant.  She would bring food that she had made for me to church.  After I had the baby, she always wanted to hold her in Relief Society, and always asked me if she could steal her and take her home.

Of course we had to get someone to take a shot of us together with the Becks.  We owe them many, many thanks for putting up with us, for accepting us in spite of our tactlessness, unorthodox views, and strong opinions.  You guys rock!

My first thought when I saw this picture was wow, we actually got a picture where Michelle isn't making a funny face.  Then I saw the next picture. 

much more typical :)

We know P1 will go on just fine without us.  It already has.  But we miss it.

Rachel's baby shower

After returning from France, Michelle Beck and I put on a Mickey Mouse themed baby shower for the lovely Rachel Tucker, who has since had a darling little boy.  We were supposed to have the party outside but we were a little nervous about the weather, so it ended up inside, in my partially packed up apartment.  Not the most exciting venue, but it worked.  Unfortunately, I didn't get a single picture of the actual shower itself, but I did catch a few of the decor.

Michelle mad that awesome banner.  Love it!

Mickey Oreos... not as picture perfect as the ones I saw on Pinterest, but hey

cupcakes

diaper cake

Oliver wanted to take a picture too, so here's his.

Many congratulations to the Tuckers on their new little guy.

one of those days

Today was not my favorite day ever.  I woke up on the wrong side of the bed.  I love being a mom, and I adore my baby, but once in a while, I have one of those days where I just want to do what I want to do when I want to do it.  Since that is all but impossible with a baby, it is frustrating at times.  Baby woke up around 6, and I really did not want to get up with her then, but, of course, it is what it is.  After about an hour, Zack relieved me and I was able to get a little more sleep.  Thanks babe.  But I was still tired.  And grumpy.

Monday afternoon, our landlord came by and gave us a notice that we had to clear everything out of all the drawers and cupboards in our kitchen.  In 24 hours.  Or they would charge us a $50 fine.  That's annoying under the best of circumstances but my life is already a complete mess.  My baby is such a crappy napper.  Even when she does nap, she will not stay asleep for more than a few minutes unless someone is touching her.  Which means that when she's napping, I am confined to the bed also.  Which means that I don't get anything done.  I don't have time to clean.  I don't have time to exercise.  I don't eat lunch most days because I don't have a chance to make myself anything.  So to clear out my entire kitchen in a single day is really an overwhelming task for me.  Zack helped, and we got it done Monday late afternoon/evening. 

The reason why we had to clear all that out is so they could come spray for cockroaches.  While I am very happy to have a landlord who cares about pest control and all that, none of it makes sense to me.  We had to clear out our cupboards so they could come by and spray bug poison in them.  I then felt the need to clean out all of the cupboards since they were empty anyhow and I don't want all my food and dishes sitting in bug poison. So I guess I basically just undid what they did.  They got the spraying done yesterday afternoon, but we didn't get a chance to put it back together until today.  Which helps explain my mood probably.  We hadn't really had a kitchen in 48 hours, we had to put the whole thing back together, including scrubbing the whole thing down (which normally wouldn't be a bad thing, but we just moved in 2 months ago and things still looked pretty darn spick and span).  *Sigh* The entire thing was just so frustrating to me.  I have never had a landlord ask me to do anything like that before.

Empty kitchen

all my kitchen stuff on the floor in the living room

More kitchen stuff on the living room floor

Besides that, baby napped like crap today (surprise!), we had kind of a fiasco of a shopping trip this afternoon, and baby went down like a gem this evening (she is actually not so bad at night sleep) but then our upstairs neighbors came home and made a huge amount of noise and woke her up, and it took another hour to get her back down.

I know these are trivial problems, especially considering the problems of so many others out there.  But it's still the kind of day that warrants a Double Gulp sized Diet Coke from the Sev and some junk food (yep, with no exercise and this kind of diet, I am going to look 6 months pregnant forever.)

The Final Day

Yes, it's true.  We have finally made it to the final day of our trip.  Can you believe it?

Because Sam really only had this one full day in Paris, we decided to do the open top bus tour thing again in an attempt to see as much as possible.  In Paris, there are 4 loops on the bus tour.  We started with the main loop that shows many of the most popular touristy sights.  Of course, we had already seen many of these sights already, but it was still a blast.

Bus tour

Opera 

Bus tour

Arc de Triomphe du Carrousel

Louvre

You can see where people have attached locks to the bridge.  You are supposed to add the lock and throw the key in the river, often to commemorate love or a special occassion. 

Tour St Jacques

Fabulous view

Notre Dame 

We got a kick out of this.  In front of the Hotel De Ville, they had this place set up with a bunch of huge pillow and a really big TV screen so people could watch the Olympics.

 This is the first time we got right up by the Arc de Triomphe.

Dome Church

 After stopping for some lunch, we hopped back on the bus tour for the Montmartre loop.

pretty church

Moulin Rouge

 While on this loop, things really started to go downhill.  The baby started getting pretty upset, and after a while, seemed pretty inconsolable.  We tried and tried to calm her down to no avail.  We even tried going to the underneath part of the bus.  No luck.  Since we weren't getting anything out of the tour anyway, and we were probably bothering everyone else on the bus, we decided to get off.  Sam and the parents got off too and we parted ways.  Zack and I headed back to the hotel to see if we could get the baby to relax, and the rest of them headed off for more sightseeing.
The baby was pretty difficult for the rest of the day, and we were unable to do any more sightseeing.  It was a little disappointing, but not so bad considering that we had already seen most of what we really wanted to see in Paris.  Plus, this was the only day in the entire trip that she really prevented us from doing what we wanted to do... pretty amazing for a 2-and-a-half week long trip.  So we spent the rest of the day holed up in the hotel room.  We did venture out for a bit while the baby snoozed in the car seat, and we picked up souvenirs for ourselves and some of our peeps.  We grabbed some Chinese take out and ate it in the hotel room for dinner.  Hee hee.  Not exactly how I imagined my anniversary in Paris, but I can't complain.
We had early flights the next day, so we headed to the airport very, very early in the morning.  We had arranged for a shuttle to the airport, but apparently they expected there to be 1 fewer of us than there was.  The driver tried to insist that I hold the baby on the drive instead of having her in her car seat so that there would be room for the other people scheduled to be picked up.  I wasn't okay with that.  Thankfully, the adults in our group squished into the back seat all together so that baby could have a seatbelt.
We went home in reverse of the way we came.  Charles de Gaulle to Iceland to JFK to Penn Station to Philly.  Baby was awesome again.  The worst part of the way home was when we were at Penn Station.  We had already be traveling for hours at that point.  The station was so crowded.  We did not have a ton of time between our arrival at the station and the departure of our train.  We were starving.  Z went and grabbed us some food real fast, then we went hunting for a red cap who would assist us down to the train platform.  We tried to get some help for quite a while, and no one would.  Finally, we had no time left, so we just headed to the escalator.  Of course, the lady working there gave us a huge spit about taking our stroller on the escalator, even without the baby in it, and tried to insist that we get red cap assistance.  We explained that we had been trying for quite a while with no success and we were going to miss our train.  She finally let us through, but it was so hard with all our luggage, the stroller, carrying the baby, and our food.  Just when we were really wondering if we were really going to make it, a kind man offered to help us with our luggage, and we made it onto the train.  After all that, baby was pretty upset, and cried for a while on the train.  It wasn't to crowded and the other passengers were so kind and understanding.  After maybe 20 or 30 minutes, she fell asleep, and all was well.  That was really the only time she cried for anything more than a second or two the entire way there or back.  Pretty crazy what a good baby we have.

Funny words in Iceland

If anyone made it all the way through our France trip with me, I thank you.  I really wanted to get the whole thing recorded, for my own sake, and for Clara's also.  It was an amazing experience... probably once in a lifetime for people like us.