Pittsburg

I had the funnest opportunity to hang out with some of the funnest people I know.  I was invited to go to Sister's Weekend with John's family.  There was Susanne and Wendy from Las Vegas, Andy from Boise, Gina who is now firmly in , Emily who hosted in Pittsburgh, and John's Mom Delores.  When they told me we would have fun and they would be crazy, I thought they were exaggerating, oh no, they were being literal.

I flew there after they had been there a few days and they all came to pick me up from the airport.  We went to the Cheesecake Factory, so yummy, and got cheesecakes to stay and go.  Then we drove through part of Pittsburgh to get back to the hotel, and I've decided it's a great city.  So much to look at all the time.  It's an older city and I love that.  Our hotel was perfect, right on the water front and next to lots of fun places.  We went on "the incline" which is like a railroad track going straight up the hillside in a little streetcar-ish thing.  It was way steep and thrilling.  The view at the top was incredible.  We got there right at sunset and view is of the city skyline in pinks and reds.  It might have been my favorite part.  Then we walked back to our hotel, but on the way there was this fountain and music show and the next thing I know, the sisters are singing and dancing, jumping of benches all while people in restaurants are watching.  I had no idea they were so entertaining.  We took some goofy pictures.

Our first night we did "our 3 favorite things" which I stupidly left at home.  But it was still very fun.  Some favorites were: eye shadow, sun glasses, lotion, chocolate, a poem, FHE idea book, lip gloss, and many other very fun things.  They also sang happy birthday and gave me a gift card to the movies.  So nice and gracious people.

Ok, I also didn't realize how relaxing this trip would be, because they like reading too, and so I got to read my book.  Very nice.  The next day we went to "the strip" and to my pleasure it was nothing like the Vegas strip.  It's a market place style street that has so many shops and people selling food and antiques and everything. I loved this Italian store that had yummy bread and big vats of olive oil.  It was very fun.  There was this art store and they had these little figurines of fleas made of steel doing different jobs.  Later that day we went to Phipps, which is a giant greenhouse.  I've never seen anything this big before filled with trees and flowers of all kinds.  I really liked the orchid room to see all the beautiful styles of orchids.  

Let's see, my memory is fuzzy.  I know at one point we hung out at the hotel and I slept for almost 2 hours!  We went to a movie and shopping, I found some way cute shoes.  We saw Prince Caspian which I thought was cute.  

It was so great to get to know them better.  They are all so sweet and accepting.  I was partly there to represent my John since being the only boy in the family has left him out more than once, just by circumstances.  It made him feel better about those times knowing because of him I can be part of them now.  Such fabulous women, I love and respect them all.  It was a little hard being away from John, ok very hard.  But the pain of our separation was worth it.  :)