Road Trippin...

I've been seriously slacking again with this thing but it's not for a lack of trying I swear! I open this up once a day at least but then get side tracked with work or other importantly wifely duties!

Anyways, I was sorting thru our mass of pictures looking for a good one of just me with no sunglasses and found that those are very hard to come by (although that's a blog for another day) and thought I'd share a few from our roadtrip when we moved back to the East coast. We spent about 2 weeks making our way back across the country - taking the northern route this time (we did the southern route on the way out 5 years prior). On our trip we spent most of our time between Yellowstone Natnl Park and Grand Tetons Natnl Park but also made a push for Badlands, Mt Rushmore, and Devils tower! It was quite the experience and generated over 500 images that I have yet to fully sort thru:)

I dont have room to post them all here but you can see more at kloeppingphotography.com if you're interested (use the link on the right there).

Going in order - top to bottom the images are: Grand Tetons from the otherside of the Paintbrush Divide, Devils Tower at Sunset (we barely got there in time), Mt. Rushmore, and Our Camping spot in the Upper Paintbrush Canyon (you can barely see the Grand Teton peeking over the other mountains)

Remembering them...

The Vietnam Memorial is both a sobering and awe inspiring structure. Walking the path along the walls and reading the names of those that gave their life is an emotional experience. Seeing the notes to loved ones now gone and the flowers and artifacts really drives home the fact that these were real people with real families and not just names on a slab of granite. I can't help but tear up at these sights yet feel a warmth in my heart that they will always be remembered for the heroic commitment they made to their country.

I wonder if they'll ever erect a memorial for all the lives given in todays war on terror?

If you're the pray'n type, say an extra one for the men and women that are serving their country today and those that have served in the past. It's a very heroic and selfless act to put yourself in danger to better the world for those around you.

almost spring...

You can tell it's almost spring - the weather is warming up (at least here in DC) and the flowers are starting to push up from below the surface. This is particularly exciting for me since I planted TONS of spring flowers last fall in hopes of a magnificant burst of color to pull me out of the winter doldrums! Well, it's started! Here are a few shots of what I hope is the beginning of an amazing show!!!

Puppy meets baby...

So, I mentioned before that we had our nephews over for the weekend with my brother-in-law and sister-in-law and this was the first time Macie ever met a toddler:) We discovered that she loves rice cereal with squash! I don't know that i need to explain too much here...
hmm....looks like you dropped something on your bib! Let me clean it up for you.

Uh oh...forgot some on your face, I'll get that (notice the food on her head and just about everywhere else).It's okay mom, she's just getting the rest of my lap!

Air and Space....

This past weekend we took our nephews to the Udvar-Hazy center which is part of the Air and Space Museum at the Dulles airport.

Now, every little boy loves planes, trains and automobiles and my little nephew is no exception. He's not so much into trains and automobiles but give him planes and he's in heaven! The almost 3 year old couldn't hold still and was pulling Aunt Inzy from plane to plane. "Let ee dat un" as he points his cute little fingers to the next exhibit. He'd exclaim that that one had wheels and the other one didn't (observant little critter I tell ya). I tried to explain to him how helicopters don't alway need wheels while airplanes almost always do. I have no idea if he understood me but who cares - the smile on his face was priceless.


As we made our way over to the space exhibit I tried my hand at explaining the concept of outer space and why we need shuttles and satellites. I know, I'm crazy for trying to explain that to a 3 year old but I think we really got the concept that space was where the moon lives. He knows what the moon is, or at least can point it out in the sky so I thought I'd go with that. Heck, I can tell him that it's made of green cheese and I'm sure he'd believe me!


There was a section of a space laboratory towards the back of the hanger and he asked; "what dat?". I explained that that's where the astronauts lived when the went to visit the moon. Okay, so that's not entirely true but what does he care? Well, my response prompted the ever cycling question: "Why?". He loves playing the "why?" game with us. I know he understands what he's doing because he laughs hysterically after about the 4th "why?"


Now, this wasn't our first time to the museum (and I'm sure it's not our last). A few week prior we came with Mark's parents because Mark's dad was a bit of a plane buff. I didn't realize how much so until I saw him when we walked through the doors. Apparently you don't have to be a little boy to love this place! I think we lost my father in law more than once and as we peeled him away from the SR-71 he was vowing to come back as soon as he retired (which is in about 25 days actually - I have a feeling we'll be seeing more of him)


All in all we had two very productive trips and a great time was had by all. I've alway been a commercial airliner buff but now find myself quite attracted to anything that flys. The old war planes I think are my favorite. The last image we have here is of the Enola Gay. Yes, it's the real thing - it made it's final flight into Dulles Airport and rests here for everyone to see. It's a pretty amazing aircraft with 4 huge prop engines and a super shiny exterior. It's hard to imagine that the aircraft that had such an impact on our world history finds it's final resting place is just a few miles from my house!

Pieces of Macie....

So you'll find that I take a lot of pictures of our Vizsla Macie. There are many reasons for this. She's patient (usually), she's pretty (always - but i'm biased), she's good for a laugh (or a frustrated yell), and well, she's here sitting next to me all the time and so is my camera. Like any loving puppy mommy who likes to take pictures you want to capture every emotion and funny pose she does. Well, okay, maybe I'm a little crazy but you have to agree - she's pretty:)

Yesterday she was sunning herself in our bedroom on the floor and I just had to snap a few. I call this set - Pieces of Macie:)


Whaddaya think?

Sunny San Diego...

This summer Mark and I had a number of opportunities to travel and I thought I'd share a few of those here since we ended up with some amazing pictures! Now, we're more into landscapes than anything else so that's what you'll see mostly. We've just now started to take pictures of people and other objects:)
Our first trip of the summer was to San Diego. I had to go for work and Mark had never been so he tagged along (heck, we only pay for a plane ticket for him - everything else was paid for!). I spent most of my days working while he was out sight seeing and mountain biking. The nice part was that we had the weekend on the front end and back end of the trip to see things together so it worked out well. He scouted out the cool places and just took me back there when we had time!:)
The picture above is the San Diego skyline from Coronado Island. He found it one day while just driving around and just had to show me. This was set on a 10 second exposure hence the movement on the water.

That night we tried so hard to find a nice place to eat that wouldn't cost my entire stipend but on the water in Coronado that's a difficult thing to do. We did find a little cafe that hung out on the water that looked okay from the front and the price was right. Well, we learned a lesson that night. While my fish and chips were okay (how can you mess that up really right?) the seafood alfredo that Mark ordered left a lot to be desired. Never order such a dish from a place with vinyl tablecloths! I'm going to write that one down in my life lesson book!

Most nights we were able to take in a sunset - one of our favorite things to do on the west coast! Mark scouted the places during the day and we rushed there after I was done working to try to see it. Some nights we made it, some nights we didn't. Regardless we always ended up somewhere beautiful to end our day at.

The picture above is from a random place along the coast that Mark found in one of his outings. We parked at the end of a random street and found a random path that's apparently pretty popular with the locals as a place to hang. Since there was a nice path we decided to lug the big camera and the big tripod (which takes up 1/4 of our biggest suitcase and weighs 10 lbs!) down to the water in hopes of catching a few great sunset shots. Well, the sun went down to quickly and the clouds were just not cooperating so we ended up with a timed exposure of the water crashing into the shoreline - pretty cool if you ask me. Not a bad second prize.


Sunsets on the weekends were much easier to do and it allowed us to set up for the picture above. We went out to Torrey Pines to do a little hike after a long day at the beach and happened upon this really cool cliff. With the wide angle lens Mark was able to catch the glow that the sun creates on the sandy cliffs. Let me not forget to mention that he was teetering on the edge of this cliff just to get the right shot - no wait - i teetered to set it up and he used the remote to fire the shot! Actually...I don't even remember him taking this shot - never mind:) He must have set it up while I was wondering elsewhere. You know, it's amazing what comes out of this camera sometimes. He's much better at it than I am - I go for luck, he actually thinks about it and uses the right settings. That's probably why his shots are better than mine!


Imperial beach was one stop we made on our way thru La Jolla. I just really liked the Lucite surfboard thingys on the entrance sign. That artistic feel carried thru the beach as there were other sculptures and works of art along the beach walk ways. It was a pretty cool place.

I unfortunately don't have any pics from the craziest part of our trip. We tried to get out to some place in the mountains that apparently had the best apple pie we'd ever eat (according to Uncle Ralph) and were met with a freak snow storm that caused us to turn around for fear we'd get out there and not be able to get back. The strangest part is that it was 65 and sunny at the coast and not more than 1 hour inland it was snowing ginormous flakes and accumulating to the tune of 2 inches on the roads.

I'll stop there before this become a full blown novel but will do another post later with more pictures. We did a trip to the Zoo and the botanical gardens. We went to see more beaches and really toured around Torrey Pines. We spent some time out on the peninsula at the military grave yard and the light house (which was on a military base!) and so much more. The trip to San Diego was amazing and so worth it. Even with just a few day to really see things we had an awesome time and Mark won't stop talking about wanting to go back...

Hold the Whiz...

I was scanning back through old pictures looking for a good shot of my father in law for a project and found these guys.

Last winter Mark and I went to Philly to visit his sister and decided to make a day of it. I told him that we couldn't go to Philly without having a cheese steak. After asking around, the locals said there were three choices: Pats, Genos, and Jims. (I'm sure there are many many others but these were the ones people on the streets recommended). Looking at the map we were closer to Jims Steaks so we decided to head there.

Boy were we in for an experience!

The line for Jim's was out the door and around the corner. It extended into the neighborhood for about a block and a half. Good - lots of people waiting - this has to be good right? So, we took our place in line and began the wait (did I mention it was about 32 degrees that day?). Well 10 min turned in to 20 which then quickly in to 40 - you see where I'm going with this. After about hour chatting with our new line friends and trying to guess how much longer we'd be standing there we finally made it to the door of the shop (yes, an hour in the cold just for a cheeze steak - what can I say, I was determined). We were greeted with some much needed warm air and the realization that we'd be standing around for another 30 min at least because the line wrapped around the inside of the shop 4 times!

I took this 30 min to snap a few shots (once my fingers defrosted) and observe the crowd that was just as crazy for cheese steaks as we were. There were all types of people - some seasoned cheese steak veterans that knew exactly what they wanted and knew how to order it (in the local lingo) to the average tourist (like ourselves) that wanted a taste of Philly and who was willing to wait for hours for it! They were young and old, big and small, skinny and heavy (although there were decidedly more heavy people than skinny ones - that's what you get for putting cheese whiz on your sandwich).

What amazed me is that in all this chaos, a mass of people and winter coats, there was laughter and joking. People that didnt know one another before this day formed a temporary bond that is the quest for the cheese steak. You could see the experienced ones helping out the tourists in their ordering lingo (whiz - no whiz - what a question!) and the tourist sharing a story or two of their travels. It was acutally quite fun.

After about 30 min inside it was my turn at the order deck and I'm so glad I was paying attention. The cook at the grill was taking orders spit fire and if you hesitated he would heckle you (which only made the hesitation worse). It was all in good fun - the ribbing from the cook - and it all added to the experience and atmosphere but I have to say it was a little stressful! I got my small provolone with mushrooms and no whiz (which generated a collective gasp from those around me - no whiz! what was I thinking?!) and happily tromped back out into the cold to find a place to eat my sandwhich! And boy was it a good sandwhich!