Aquarium

Second day of Spring Break and I could tell when we got home from the Aquarium it was going to be an exhausting week...a fun one, but an exhausting one. First of all, Haddy has decided not not wake up at 8:30 anymore....she went from 8:30 to 6:30 pretty dang fast, and I'm not okay with it...but what can ya do? Also, trying to hurry and get everything packed and ready and out the door is a little bit stressful, I will admit. When we went to the aquarium we actually forgot the stroller!! Thankfully they had some to rent, which was a lifesaver. And these days include a lot of walking around, which is fine, but I'm still recovering from my flu and my energy level isn't where it normally is, so this wears me out. Anyways, the aquarium was really cool but the lighting inside was not ideal for a non-fancy camera, so unfortunately most of our pictures are blurry, but I will post a few anyway. The ones outside are fine, but there aren't very many outside ones....

Haddy LOVED the fish. She learned to bark from my parent's dogs over Christmas break, now she barks when she sees animals, so she was barking at the fish all day! It was so cute!

More fish, more barking.

This is the actual size of a shark's jaws.....creepy!

Justin touching a stingray...he tried very hard to get me to do it but touching sea creatures is definitely not my thing!

This was the bird/hippo exhibit.

Haddy and I in front of the bird thing

Our faces our blurry, but we thought this was a pretty funny sign :)

More fish, and more barking.

The hippos were in this exhibit but asleep at the time.

Oh no! Haddy's been eaten by a shark! Oh ha ha ha, I'm just kidding, that's just a fake shark. No need to worry!

The shark tunnel was really cool, but proved to be the hardest place for a good picture. This one is super blurry and it's the best we got...

Justin wanted a picture with the sharks so bad, and this is the least blurry out of about ten....

These are penguins. Finally, some non-blurry pictures!

I love those two.

Justin, Haddy, and Philly

Me, Haddy, and Philly.

We had a fun time at the aquarium yesterday, today we are going to the zoo! Hopefully they have Dr Pepper there....

The Franklin Institute

This week is Justin's Spring Break, and we are taking major advantage of it! We got a City Pass (which gives you tickets to a bunch of things to do in the city), and we are planning on going to New York for the day on Friday.
Today we went to the Franklin Institute and it was AMAZING!! I've never had so much fun at a museum. Here are some pictures from our fun-filled day!

Haddy and I out front

That is good ol' Benjamin Franklin! This room was really pretty, and very impressively large.

This picture should be obvious, right? haha, no. This was in the planetarium, we saw a show about Black Holes and it was AWESOME!! It had one of those domed screens that's above your head, and it was so cool. Justin said this was his favorite part of the day.

This is a telescope, and there was a screen on the ceiling showing what the telescope shows that Haddy could not take he eyes off of!

Here she is looking at the screen, straining her neck.

This is a big train, and it moved!

This is Justin and Haddy ON that big train, before it started to go.

This is Haddy and I above an airplane, about to get in.

Here we are, in the airplane.

You can't tell, but we're in a room that blows a lot of air on you really fast, and you're supposed to pick up these foam wings and feel the "lift" when you hold them correctly. Haddy loves wind so she loved this little simulator!

Now THIS was cool! You were supposed to call someone on your cell phone, and this wall's lights lit up from the electric reaction, and when I did it the lights went crazy!! We figured this is why you're supposed to turn your phones off on airplanes, and this wall showed the phones really do interfere with electronics! It was cool.

LOVED this! This was the big heart! I wish I could've taken my health classes through this heart. You can't see me, but I'm at the top.

Here's one where Justin's at the top. Again, hard to see.

This was a tunnel in the "changing earth" section. When we walked into the section, all of a sudden we thought there was an earthquake! But it was just the room! It felt and sounded way real. And this was some tunnel in the exhibit.

There was a thing where you could go into a room with a green screen, and you could be a pretend weather person. Well Haddy and I did it, this is me on the TV screen, it's  a really bad picture and you can't see the "weather" I'm predicting, but you get the point. It was really fun! And I sucked at being a weather person....

Here is Justin controlling this big crane thing. I did it too, and we pretty much rocked it.

Here I am, racing. No biggy.

Justin and Haddy surfing.

Here I am, "falling" off the surf board.

Rock climbing!

I rocked it.

Boo-ya.

THIS thing was FUN!!!! It was supposed to show you how much faster you spin when your body is all close together, but basically it was a spinny thing that spun really fast. I felt like a little kid! And no one was even supervising us, we could break all sorts of rules we wanted!

Justin riding the "sky bike." Again, so awesome.

Here he is again.

And again.

I highly recommend the Franklin Institute.
We are going to the Aquarium tomorrow :)

V-day, Waiting, and Fam update.

Our Valentine's Day tradition is to go out to eat Sushi, so this year we were excited to try a place in Philly! We looked on Yelp and finally decided on a place called Harusame and I can honestly say it's the best sushi I've ever eaten!!! Of course we usually go to cheap places, so maybe that's not saying much, but still it was delicious. AND what's even better is they had DR PEPPER!!! Maybe that doesn't seem like a big deal, but it is. I've learned that Dr Pepper not as popular in the east, so it is almost never served at restaurants. I had come to accept this but it was such a wonderful surprise when I found out they had it! It made my day. The service was awesome, atmosphere was great, and since it was Valentine's day they gave all the women a box of chocolates and a rose when they left. Needless to say, they come highly recommended in my book.
In other wonderful news, we have two beautiful new nieces! One was born on Justin's side of the family on January 26th, two days before Haddy's birthday. Her name is Amelia Veda Funk and she is adorable! Our other new niece is my sister's new baby Isla Claire Murray, born on February 10th and I love her so much! Sadly, we don't get to meet these new additions until the end of April at the soonest, but thankfully we have technology so both families frequently send us pictures! We also have another new niece/nephew due at the end of May we are excited for!
As many know, Justin is finishing up his Master's degree here in April, and he has applied for PhD programs so we are playing the (frustrating) waiting game. At first I was discouraged by the fact we hadn't heard from anyone yet, but then I remembered we applied to all these same schools last year for their Masters programs and we didn't hear back from anyone until March. So that made me feel a little better....but I still hate waiting. Justin has been nervous about hearing back from the schools. He has an incredibly narrow and rare research interest, and there are pretty much no professors doing exactly what he wants to study (it's a brand new field called Social Entrepreneurship and it's so new they pretty much just have business people teaching a few classes in social work programs, but no Professor specifically working on it). He also applied to the only four programs that fund your entire PhD, so they are super competitive along with not having perfect research match-ups. But we know there is a plan for us! And I am more and more impressed by my wonderful husband's abilities everyday! Even if we didn't get into any of the programs I know Justin will excel in whatever path he takes. Most likely he would work for a year and apply to PhD programs again the next year. Yes, it would be a setback, and sometimes it's hard to have faith when you can't see the bigger picture, but I know that if we do have faith then what's supposed to happen will happen. I love my little family so much, and I know we can get through anything together.
As for the family: Haddy is so wonderful. She is on the verge of walking, she's totally off formula (yay!), she speaks her own language that sounds similar to how a laser-gun sounds, and she kind of has mcgyver hair. She is so so beautiful, and so much fun to play with. I love being her mom and getting to see her cute face everyday.
Justin is beyond awesome at what he does. He's so passionate about learning and he loves his classes. His Professors all adore him, one in particular raves about his papers to the class on a regular basis, and has even nominated him for an international social work award. One time I picked Justin up from class and his Professor walked him out just so he could talk to me and tell me how stellar Justin is. He said he's been teaching for over 20 years and he knows he'll go far. I completely agree, Justin has so much drive and I absolutely know he is going to help change the world someday.
Me: Well, I'm sick again (surprise surprise). This time my dr thinks it's the flu. Blech. But today I'm feeling a little better so hopefully I'm on the mend. That's pretty much all that's going on with me....
Well, that's all for now. There are no pictures, sorry, just me talking forever. But we are going to New York in a couple of weeks so I will put a bunch of pictures up from that.

My little baby is growing up *sniff*

My darling baby girl turned 1 on January 28th. I can't believe how fast this last year has gone by! Yes, I know, typical mom thing to say, but it's true. She has grown so much so fast and I am truly thankful to be her mom. I adore my baby, she is my best little friend and I love her so much!
Well for her birthday we wanted to do something she would think was fun. We thought about going swimming but couldn't find a fun indoor pool around here that's similar to the one we went to in Bountiful. Then we decided to go to the museum! Penn has an anthropology museum we went to and had a great time! Then when we got home from a long day of walking around, I made some Philly Cheesesteaks for dinner with Jalapeno Cream sauce! I was trying to copy Moochie's jalapeno sauce recipe, but I couldn't find it online so I just made the first one I did find, but it turned out really good!
The next day we had cake and ice cream. Haddy got her own little cake and proceeded to completely devour it.... I was worried she would be sick but so far she seems fine!

I remember so well the day Haddy was born. It was so weird to all of a sudden be a mom and have a baby! But we fell in love with her as soon as she came out. It took them a while to stitch me up so I had to wait to hold her about 45 minutes, but she was worth it! Beautiful big eyes, dark hair (which later fell out and grew back light)...simply perfect.
It's true what they say about stay-at-home moms having a hard job. It has definitely not been easy, but the highs are so worth the lows that there's no question about it, I have the greatest job there is! I feel so blessed to have such a healthy, thriving, happy little girl. She has such a fun personality and I hate it when she goes down for naps because I have so much fun playing with her!
 For your viewing pleasure I have pictures of our fun weekend, I hope you enjoy them at least half as much as I do!

Haddy opened up her presents from the Cook grandparents the night before. She got two ADORABLE outfits, two cute and much needed pairs of pajamas, a fun new toy that I can't get her to stop playing with, and the movie Up!

Another picture! She also opened presents the next morning from her Barton grandparents, but we only took video of that present-opening, no pictures :( I am dumb. But they also got her two adorable outfits, two pairs of jammies, and  a really cute book! (Haddy LOVES books!)

This is the front of the beautiful museum!

This room was massive.

This is a cool Chinese dragon thing. Haddy liked it.

Haddy in the sarcaphagas! (I have no clue if I spelled that right by the way...)

Haddy looking at a dead person.

Haddy and I looking outside in a glass hallway.

Sphinx! Third largest in the world. And we saw it. And touched it....but don't tell the museum staff that...

To scale a bit...

After a long day of museum-going, Haddy was pooped!

This is my delicious home-made philly cheesesteak! I am so awesome.

Jalapeno cream sauce....mmmmmmm

Getting ready for cake and ice cream!

The cake I made.

Haddy's personal cake! I fell in love with it when I saw it because it had a purple unicorn.

Haddy in her birthday outfit, just reading a book to kill time before people got there.

Ohhh the anticipation.....

She's a little tentative at first....

But as you can see, that didn't last long!

Look at that face. Darling.

And here it comes......the sugar rush!

The end!