After Reading This, You'll Think We Went on the Longest Vacation Ever

The story of this vacation begins last summer when Shantel and I were first dating. Watching how much she loved her family made me think that maybe she would have an easier time falling for me if she could see tangible evidence that I love my family too. I do love my family. I love them a lot. But being on the other side of the country from them isn't as hard for me as it seems to be for others, so I don't go back east and visit them all that often. After all, they kept coming out to Utah and seeing me here, so why go there, right? (Although my dad was just in Utah and he failed to see me while he was here, so maybe it is a good thing we went there, huh?)

So in order to produce that tangible evidence that I am a family man I decided that I should go to Maryland and see my family for Christmas, something I hadn't done in two years. I called my dad, and we made the arrangements for me to fly out.

I even considered the possibility that maybe Shantel and I would be far enough along in our relationship that it would be time for her to meet my family come December. I figured she could come out for a few days and then fly back home to be with her family for Christmas. I thought it was a brilliant plan on my part.

Now I recognize that you are all laughing at me at this point, but plans change, alright?! In a relationship still considered slow by Provo standards, we got married in November but I still had a plane ticket I had to use within a year. So I bought one for Shantel and we planned a trip for immediately following her graduation, and that trip was a blast, I must say.

In spite of my terrible planning abilities it turned out to be great. I mean, who plans a trip to Maryland for a week without consulting the schedules for the Baltimore Orioles and the Washington Nationals? How did I manage to pick probably the only week of the season where both teams are gone the entire week?

I did however succeed in planning one thing: a layover in Colorado. I wanted to introduce Shantel to my favorite state in America.

I'm thinking this was a terrible way to do it.

From start to finish it was the worst flight I have ever been on. Takeoff was ridiculously steep and enough to make even the most iron stomached individual a little queasy. Then it was like the pilot remembered in midair, "Oh yeah, Denver. For some reason I thought we were headed to Idaho!" He then proceeded to turn the plane at a 90 degree angle. I'm no pilot, but a nice, easy curve would seem to make sense to me.

Being a short flight we never really leveled off, and as soon as we reached our peak we began our descent. And then we encountered an unbelievable amount of turbulence. I seriously think we may have flown upside down for a little bit. But we made it. Although it may have come at a cost: Shantel may never want to travel with me again.

There was a bright side to this brief visit to Colorado. It was Purple Monday, so we wore our Rockies shirts while in their home state.

Reppin' the Rox in Colorado

Okay, let's be honest for a second. We would have done it whether it was Monday or not. Also, another moment of honesty: my wife is awesome for humoring me and wearing her Rockies shirt on Mondays so much. I try and pretend I've converted her to loving the Rockies, but I think I need to start with getting her to love baseball, then she'll have no choice but to wear that purple with pride! Also, she's the one who noticed that our shirts spell "Colorado Rockies" when we sit this direction. Awesome.

The next leg of the flight was significantly better. Although, Shan was already feeling sick from the first flight so it probably didn't feel much better to her, but I promise, it was actually really smooth.

My dad picked us up in the airport and it didn't take long for this to turn into a sports vacation. Actually, it may have started with the Rockies shirts. But it continued in the car as we listened to a couple of baseball games. We were listening to the Nationals playing the Braves, but then suddenly they were talking about Matt Carpenter and I was so confused. I was baffled that he had been traded from the Cardinals to one of these teams we were listening to. Turns out he hadn't, but my dad had switched games on me while I wasn't paying attention. Not that this has anything whatsoever to do with how awesome our vacation was... Back on point!

Our first full day in Maryland we spent in Baltimore, and it was a lot of fun. It was one of those days that we saw a lot, but it was relaxing at the same time. It was definitely less stressful than DC (though DC was still awesome, but we'll get to that).

The pictures will tell most of the story from here on out:

We first went to Ft. McHenry, the birthplace of America's National Anthem.

We had a little fun:

I feel like my job would have been to check the cannons
in the event they got jammed.

Is anyone really surprised Shantel ended up
behind bars?

We tried to replicate a picture that was taken at Ft. McHenry when I was a kid:

Adorable, right?

Speaking of adorable, the best picture of our trip to Fort McHenry:

After Fort McHenry our day in Baltimore turned into something I would love more than Shantel: a day of sports!

Oriole Park at Camden Yards

Me with The Great Bambino

Me and Brooks Robinson

My hands on a bat actually used by
The Sultan of Swat.

Look, Ma! I made the cover of Sports Illustrated!

The wheels on the bus go round and round...

Don't worry, Shantel found ways to
have fun, too.

And with the 15th pick of the 2013 MLB draft,
the Baltimore Orioles select...

I'm going to Disney World!

Nice to meet you , Poe. I'm Shantel.

My dad fulfilled his dream of calling the play
in an NFL huddle.

After having a sports filled day (which also included lunch at Camden Yards with a beautiful view of the stadium), we finished it off with a beautiful walk around Baltimore's Inner Harbor.

I even got to high five the old mayor.

My dad would like it known it was the ground that was
crooked, not the picture.

The next day we stuck a little closer to my family's house. We went to Bryce Harpers Ferry and then explored downtown Frederick a little bit before going to a Minor League Baseball game that night.

Bryce Harpers Ferry was a nice old town with some cool history and beautiful scenery:

She loves me, she loves me not, she loves me...

I believe a "Twankey" was the Twinkie of the past. Although
now the Twinkie is the Twinkie of the past, too...

It took forever to take a nice photo since we were
constantly swatting at all the bugs.

But we did it!

We also got some nice shots in downtown Frederick. I think we got some nicer ones on a different camera, maybe some where we weren't slouching, but look at how beautiful it is! My family lives there! Well... the next town over, but still! Pretty!

Hmm... Maybe you wouldn't have noticed we were slouching if hadn't said anything?

Nat with her foul ball. My dad leaning away from the picture.
Kind of like he did when the ball came his way...

Then we went to the Frederick Keys (Minor League Baseball - Single A affiliate of the Baltimore Orioles) baseball game that night. It was a lot of fun! The Keys' pitcher took a no-hit bid into the sixth. In fact, the opposing pitcher had a no hitter into the fourth inning I think, so it was kind of a pitchers' duel, but it was fun!  The Keys' first baseman threw a ball right to my dad. He missed it. Don't worry, we recovered it, but the event staff guy came and threatened to confiscate my dad's mitt on account of his error. What is that? E10?

I think we look even better with a baseball field behind us.

In my mind, this vacation had four purposes: 1) Convince Shantel that I really do love my family, 2) Introduce her to Colorado, however brief an introduction it was, 3) Convince Shantel that there are nice places to live outside the state of Utah (not saying we're going to end up outside of Utah, but it's nice to know it's a possibility...), and 4) Begin her conversion to the game of baseball. I feel like the first few days were mostly oriented towards that. Which means they were mostly oriented towards me. Oops!

There was no baseball the remainder of the trip. Well, I'm sure it came up. In fact, I know I watched parts of some games on TV. But other than that...

We spent Thursday in Washington D.C. and came away with a couple conclusions: D.C. is really cool to go see, and driving there is awful so we will never live there! Here's some highlights from our day in Washington:

That's us with Abe Lincoln. And a couple from Armenia
(or something) in the background.

See Shan! Utah is everywhere!

We couldn't go inside, but I suppose the Washington
Monument was still cool to see.

While at the White House, Shantel decided that she
wants to be the President's event planner.

Shantel wishes I was this huggable.

Some kind soul offered to take a picture of us in from of the FBI
building. Unfortunately he didn't get the sign right above us...

TJ has a beautiful view from his memorial.

DINOSAURS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

After the FBI building, we tried to go see the International Spy Museum. Then we remembered we were poor and paying 20+ dollars a person didn't sound real cool. Then we tried to go to the History of Crime Museum. I'm not sure why I thought that would be cheaper. So then we went and got lunch.

In front of the Capital building.

With our buddy George Mason.
I respect your Final Four run, man!

We really enjoyed our day in DC. Some other highlights included the Library of Congress, including Thomas Jefferson's personal library, and seeing the actual flag that flew over Fort McHenry at the time the national anthem was written. We really enjoyed the Natural History Museum and were sad we didn't get to spend more time there. Unfortunately, we forgot about seeing those really old pieces of paper... Oh, what are they called? Oh, yeah. The Declaration of Independence, Constitution, and Bill of Rights. Yeah, we walked right past them and forgot to return until just after they closed. So while all the stuff we saw was really, really cool, we felt sad that we were leaving without having seen those important documents. We also wished we had spent more time in the Natural History Museum, seen the Holocaust Museum, and maybe put on some sunscreen. Poor Shantel.

Ouch.

Fortunately my family is awesome. My mom drove us back to DC the next day, too. She was kind enough to show us the Pentagon, which we hadn't seen yet. Then we made sure to hit all the sites we wished we had seen the day before.

See! The FBI Building! (I had to make the picture big so you could actually read it...)

We also went back to the Natural History Museum and spent some more time there, as well as the Holocaust Museum. But most importantly we made sure to stop by and see the Constitution, Bill of Rights, and Declaration of Independence! And it really made us want to watch National Treasure. Which we did upon our return to Provo. But seriously, it was one of the highlights of the trips. It was so cool to stand in front of those pieces of parchment which have shaped our lives so tremendously. Unfortunately we couldn't take any pictures, but feel free to go to http://www.google.com and type in "Declaration of Independence" for more information.

We also met a really nice black man from Detroit. He talked to us about a lot of things, including the black population in Utah, the white Mormon missionaries he's seen in his neck of the woods, and all sorts of things. He was a really nice guy. And then he walked over to his wife and excitedly pointed to us and said "They're Mormons!" She didn't seem half as interested in meeting us as he was. Oh, well. He was still awesome!

The following day we made the trip to the one thing that Shantel had been dying to see: the Washington Temple. It was gorgeous! And the sky made all of these pictures beautiful.

Later that night we took some family pictures. There are a lot more out there, but here's some we have so far:

What a cute family!

The kids and kid-in-law.

Why yes, we are the best looking couple
in the entire world. Thank you for noticing!

The rest of the trip was very picture-free unfortunately. Kind of a shame too (I doubt you agree. You're probably sick of all the pictures at this point) because we spent some time with my cousin Krysta's adorable children, Boston and Fischer, on Sunday evening. Boston and I are gonna be sports pals when they move out here in a couple weeks. We also gave my mom a way awesome Mother's Day present (one week early). Natalie did about 99 percent of the work, but it was a sweet family history book of some of my mom's side of the family.

Monday was a nice day of travel which included the last of three trips to Chipotle on the week. (Come on, Provo. Get your act together and make me happy by getting a Chipotle!) The flying was much smoother this time for a couple of reasons. 1) Shantel took motion sickness pills and was knocked out pretty much the whole way, 2) It was a straight flight to Salt Lake, 3) we had a pilot that seemed like he actually knew how to fly an airplane, and 4) I had a sweet book about the history of baseball to read.

So did I succeed in any of my objectives? Let's evaluate:

1) Convince Shantel that I really do love my family: I think so. I mean, my smile in those family photos looks pretty genuine, right?

2) Introduce her to Colorado, however brief an introduction it was: Introduction? Check. Positive first impression? Dang... Pretty ridiculous failure.

3) Convince Shantel that there are nice places to live outside the state of Utah: I thought it went well. She loved all the shutters on houses in my family's neighborhood. She loved how beautiful and green it was. I think she enjoyed all the sites we saw. But she still recently remarked, "I still wouldn't want to live out there." WHAT?! I blame the DC road system and horrendous traffic.

4) Begin her conversion to the game of baseball: Well... I love baseball even more than I already did. Does that count?

Regardless of how my personal goals for the trip turned out, I think the trip was an overwhelming success! It was a lot of fun and I think it has made us excited to travel more together!

And maybe next vacation Shantel will do the report at the end and she'll make it easier on the eyes and brain.