First stop? Pittsburgh!

D and I are very fortunate to be teachers and what we lack in salary, we are well compensated in the way of paid-time-off (or as most people know it - vacation)!

As it so happened, both of our Spring breaks fell during the same time frame this year. Additionally, we were both greatly blessed by the fact that though we had a full week off because of the February snowstorm, the state granted everyone graces by not shortening the Spring break at all. We had about ten straight days off (including weekends) and it has been wonderfully refreshing for us all to be able to finally return to school/work/daycare tomorrow and finish out the school year.

Last year for Spring break we did not travel and stayed completely local. This year we took things to the opposite extreme and traveled all over creation with our first stop in Pittsburgh to see Grammy and Grandpap!

Surprisingly, I didn't take as many pictures as I thought I did. *shrug* Or at least the other pictures that I took somehow disappeared! [EDIT: I remember where they are! They are on my laptop and I will upload them here in a forthcoming batch/posting]

Anyway, one of our big and fun things from Pittsburgh was visiting the Phipps Conservatory. I've never been one for gardening or pictures of flora but after seeing the gardens? I might be a convert! Never before have I seen such an amazing display of plant life in one place before! It was extraordinary and only further convinces me that the first true visual artist of the world was God himself in the very beginning. I'll even go out on a limb here and say even the Phipps could hold a candle to the Garden of Eve!

Here is just a smattering of some of the beautiful sights that we saw...




And of course Miss A was delighted with the sights just as well. Her joy to partake in was more in the way of any kind of water though. Anything that she can get into and splash around in is her thing these days and there isn't a puddle or fountain that escapes her.


These days it's hard to get Miss A to be still for even a moment but we did at least make a valiant attempt at a quick family portrait...

Perhaps the real reason she was squirming was because she didn't want to be in a picture without Grandpap (who was unable to join us on the trip) and Mama (who is always behind the camera).

Oh well! Next time Grandpap will surely be along and Mama will finally get it together and use a remote shutter release. :)