The Richardson Riot: May 2012

Well, it's been a while since I last wrote and a whole lot has happened since then! And a lot of pictures (all of which are below)! So now I guess I'll try and catch up.

Well school is very much over now and both David and I did really well in our classes, both getting all As and Bs. We're relieved that school is finally over and we get a little break. My phlebotomy class finished and we had a week break from the last day of class until the certification test and David's sister Christina really wanted us to go visit her in Seattle and so she offered to donate to our cause so that we would be able to go up and see her. So we thought... Well, why not then! Let's do it! So we packed our bags and headed off for a week long vacation in the Evergreen state of Washington!

We left right after my last phlebotomy class. I left a little early around 8:30pm and we drove all night. Well, David drove and I slept because I had had a full day of work and then class. We arrived around 10am the next morning. David called a few people to let them know that we had arrived, but instead decided to tell them that we had broken down in a small town in Oregon where his family had broken down once, it was pretty funny because they all believed him until he confessed he was joking. David slept the whole day as I enjoyed my 4 nieces and 1 nephew and my sister-in-law Christina. We spent the week seeing old friends, hanging out with family, celebrating Christina's birthday and Cinco de Mayo, going to a pinewood derby race that Ivin (my brother-in-law) had entered a few cars in ended up winning his division! We played with the triplets and spent our nights watching shows and talking with Christina and Ivin and Ivin's cousin Maddie. It was a lot of fun.

We got to go into Seattle one day while we were there and we brought our nieces Ivie and Rebekah with us and Ivin's cousin Maddie. We packed our day full of fun things! We went to Pike Place Market where we walked around and looked in shops and ate yummy macaroni and cheese for lunch at the cheese factory place. Then we went to the aquarium where we got to see an octopus and touch sea anemones (sp) and feel then suck onto our fingers. We got to watch them feed the otters! I love otters, they are usually my favorite part of any aquarium so this was extra exciting. They were super cute and it was fun to be there with the girls. After the aquarium we drove other to Alki Beach and spent about an hour playing in the sand and enjoying the sun at the beach with the girls. It was such a nice day. On our way home we stopped by a shake shop that Maddie showed us and got 3 big delicious milk shakes that we passed around the car and shared between the five of us. It was awesome! Then we stopped by the space needle because Maddie had never been before, so Maddie and I jumped out and took a few pictures and enjoyed it for about 15 minutes while David and the girls drove around until we were done. Then we went home and both of the girls fell asleep on the way home, which doesn't surprise me... We wore them out pretty good!

Well, finally our time was up and it was time to leave, my test would be the next evening, so we got up in the morning and started on our journey home to Utah (even though it would only be home for another 5 days or so). We were making good time and everything was going great... Until we started hearing a noise coming from our car. We were about 10 miles out from Le Grande, Oregon, where we had already previously decided to stop for gas and food, so we just decided to wait until we got there to see what was making the noise. Once we slowed down as we pulled into the gas station the noise got a lot louder and sounded a lot worse! We popped the hood and took a look and it was quite obvious where the problem was and that there was indeed a problem. We asked someone at the gas station where the nearest repair shop might be and we cautiously drove about 6 blocks up the main road and pulled over at the first place we saw. Our car was making so much noise at this point that the mechanic actually met us as we pulled up and said, "well, that doesn't sound good." No kidding. And it wasn't looking too good either, once we turned off the engine there was a ton of liquid coming out of our engine too. Turns out our power steering pump was completely shot. Which is really unfortunate because the day after we got married, only 8 months before this point we had replaced the very same part and it cost us $250. Apparently he gave us a junk yard part, which turned out to be exactly what you would expect from a junk yard, junk! The mechanic called all over town (which is not very many places considering the size of the town) and was unable to find the part we needed. So he called a few more places in different towns and figured out they had a brand new part in Spokane (which humorously was actually cheaper than the junk yard part we got 8 months earlier) that he could get overnighted. So we found a cheap hotel and a place for lunch and made fun out of it. We looked at a cute antique shop and walked around town and watched movies in our hotel until our car was done the next day. What was funny is that when we made a few phone calls to let people know what happened they didn't believe us because David had joked about breaking down in Oregon before, and the town he had joked about was literally like 20 away from where we actually broke down. I think it was karma ha ha. We left around 12:30. Ok, now this posed a problem for me seeing as how my phlebotomy certification test was supposed to be at 6:30pm and we were an 8 hour drive away, not to mention that we would be losing an hour. So, I got ahold of my teacher who said I could still take it if I got there by 8:30. I studied the whole car ride for a test I might not be able to take, it was kind of frustrating. I was on and off the phone with my teacher updating him on how far away we were. David was speeding the whole way. We stopped once for gas and bathroom which was a record of about a 5 minute stop. After that intense, emotional day of thinking I might not make it in time and how I just wasted a month of hard work for nothing... We arrived at 8:20! passed the test and got certified as a phlebotomist! It was a miracle! Brought on by a lot of prayers from friends and family.

Well, the next day we packed up our entire apartment. The next day we moved all of our things into a storage unit with the help of David's parents and younger siblings and my boss Steve. We packed our entire apartment, moved everything out, cleaned and checked out all within 24 hours. It was crazy and we were tired! We stayed the next few days at David's parents house, sleeping in every morning.

We left on Tuesday morning for our big adventure! David's summer internship in Washington DC at the National Institute for Standards and Technology (NIST)! We drove through Utah, Wyoming, and half of Nebraska the first day. We stayed in Kearney, Nebraska that night. We drove the next day through Nebraska, Iowa and part of Illinois. We stayed in Joliet, Illinois that night. We spent the next day in Chicago where David served his mission. We parked our car and walked around the rest of the day. We saw the bean, had some deep dish pizza for lunch, and then walked to Navy Pier where we rode a Ferris wheel and enjoyed the sights of Chicago. We drove about 2 hours to West Lafayette, Indiana where we got to spend the next 3 days with David's sister Amy and her family. That was a lot of fun! Unfortunately we were having so much fun that I didn't take any pictures the whole time. The first day wasn't super fun for me because I was throwing up all night and too sick to do anything the next day but lay in bed. David, Amy and the kids went strawberry picking though, which I was able to reap the benefits of the rest of our time there. I love strawberries! We went to our nephew Sammy's soccer game, toured Purdue University (where John, Amy's husband is currently getting his PHD and David will be applying come this fall), rested around the house, watched movies and shows, had good conversation, ate yummy food and played with the our nephews Johnny, Sammy and Davey. Once it was time to get back on the road we just had one more day until our destination. We drove through, Indiana, Ohio, West Virginia, Pennsylvania and Maryland until we made it to Gaithersburg, Maryland! Driving through the Appalachian Mountains was breathtaking and I kept telling David how much I would like to live somewhere that looked like that someday, it was amazing.

Well, we've been here just over a week now and it's great. It's really hot and humid which we're not really used to yet, especially the humidity. David started his internship and things are going well, he likes the people he works with and his project is interesting. I haven't started working yet, but I should be starting sometime this week or next week. I'm going to be babysitting a little 4 month old baby girl, so that should be fun. We've been into Washington DC once to meet up with David's sister Hannah who lives there, we got some dinner and then just walked around and talked and had fun. This week we've just been hanging out with John and Janice and their kids Isaac, Amy and Joanna. We went to a lake and went out on a little paddle boat, which was fun and really beautiful. For Memorial Day we went to a cemetery and actually ended up finding the grave of a General from the Revolutionary War who died in 1800, it was really cool, we actually googled his name and were able to read about him. After that we had a little picnic at the park. We came home and just chilled the rest of the day, I read Harry Potter (I'm on the 5th one now, The Order of the Phoenix), we took naps and then had a little BBQ that night and then watched The Hunt for Red October after the kids were in bed. I had dreams of submarines that night.

Yesterday I went to an exercise group with Janice where the kids can play and the grown ups get to exercise. Well, we didn't have a key to the building, so we ended up using a laptop on top of one of the cars and doing a work out video in the parking lot ha ha. I'm sure it was quite the sight for passers by to see 4 grown women doing a Dance Workout for Dummies video in the middle of a church parking lot ha ha, but it was really fun and we were all laughing through it.

Well, we're here to have our Washington DC adventure for the summer! Yay! Here are the pictures of our trips and the fun times we've had so far!