Fort McHenry and Baltimore Aquarium

Yesterday we finally made it into Baltimore for the first time.  We had an awesome time.  Our first stop was Fort McHenry where during the War of 1812, Francis Scott Key penned the Star Spangled Banner.  They had a nice visitors center with an excellent video presentation about the Fort.  Then we walked around the fort and checked out the bunkers, barracks, powder magazine and the guns.  The kids enjoyed it I think.  Noah was a little worried about the cannons and going in the bunkers at the fort.

Next, we headed over to the Inner Harbor in downtown Baltimore.  It was overcast the whole time, but fortunately not raining.  It is a really nice area and fun to walk around and see the sites.  We had lunch at a couple different restaurants, some people wanted potbelly's, others wanted chinese. 

As we were eating lunch we discussed the Aquarium.  We weren't planning on going on this trip, but we had previously decided that when we did go it might be good just to buy the family membership.  The we realiized that if we are going to buy the pass we might as well go. We didn't have a lot of time, but we did see the Dolphin show which the kids loved and we checked out the coral reef exhibit and the jellies.  It will be fun to go back again sometime when we have more time.

Hopefully our next post will have news about baby #4 :-)

Church History Whirlwind Tour

This past week we took a tour of some of the Church History sites in the East.  We started by driving up to Palmyra, NY.  We watched the Hill Cumorah Pageant which was awesome!  The kids even enjoyed it.  The next day we toured the Smith Farm and Sacred Grove, then saw the site of the first publication of the Book of Mormon.

After that we drove over to Niagara Falls.  The falls are amazing.  The kids enjoyed the swimming pool in the hotel more than anything.

The next day was for Kirtland, OH.  We started out by seeing the Kirtland Temple.  The kids were excited that they could go inside.  We also toured Historic Kirtland which was neat, but our two youngest began to rebel...I guess they got tired of seeing 18th century buildings.  The following day we got up and went to the Johnson Farm in Hiram, OH.  It was nice to be out in farm country.

It was a lot of driving, but overall, it was an awesome trip.  I would recommend waiting until your kids are a little older than ours, but hopefully they will remember something from the trip.

The Big Apple

Rebecca took me to New York City for my birthday. We left the kids with some friends from Church and headed off on our own. We had a lot of fun. We rode the Staten Island Ferry, visited the World Trade Center site, rode the subway a lot, went to Times Square, saw Mary Poppins on Broadway, toured the Metropolitan Museum of Art, saw the temple at Lincoln Center, ate yummy New York pizza, relaxed in Central Park, and went window shopping in Greenwich village. It was a blast!

New Germany State Park 2.0

This weekend we returned to New Germany State Park for another attempt at camping.  We felt gypped that we had to leave early last time since it rained so much.  This time around the weather was a little more cooperative.  It rained a lot both nights, but during the day on Saturday there was no rain despite the threatening clouds all day.
We saw several new forms of wildlife, including crayfish, bats, and toads.  We enjoyed riding on the paddle boats and swimming.  We also had success cooking a yummy dutch oven meal.  Here a few photos:

Calvert Cliffs

Our weekend adventure this week was to go to Calvert Cliffs, in Southern Maryland.  Calvert Cliffs is known for its fossils from the Miocene era including shark teeth and megalodon teeth.  We were excited to hit the beach for the first time on this  coast, but what we didn't realize was that we would have to hike 2 miles from the parking lot to get there.  We did not wear proper foot wear, and we had an awkward time transporting ourselves, and our fossil hunting gear (shovel, sieve, and buckets) to the beach.  It was a tough hike, but the kids did a good job and we enjoyed digging through the shells and fossils that wash up in the surf.  Here are a few pictures:

Pool time

We joined the pool club in our community.  Partly because we love swimming, and partly because it is so convenient being right next door.  It is going to be so fun to have access to a pool this Summer.  The kids have loved swimming so much and want to spend as much time there as possible.  The bottom of the pool is a little rough and they have all worn their little feet out.  Here are a couple of pictures.

Additionally, Isaac and Eliza are doing swim team and we are excited for them to become strong swimmers.

New Germany State Park

This weekend we went camping at New Germany State Park in western Maryland.  We went with our friends the Cleaves.  We had a lot of fun, but unfortunately we got rained out.  We had the site reserved for the whole weekend (Maryland forced us to) and we planned to stay Thursday and Friday nights, then come home Saturday evening.  After half a day of crazy downpour on Friday, we decided at 8pm, to throw everything in the van and head for home.  The kids had a blast fishing, boating, exploring, and catching wildlife.  We're excited to go back sometime and hopefully get more dry weather.  Here's some photos.