Jr and Caroline

Jr's birthday and Halloween 2009

2010-01-10T20:56:00.004-05:00

I just realized I didn't write anything about Jr's birthday and Halloween, both back in October!
So for Jr's birthday, I took him to the Historic Hudson Valley sites up in Sleepy Hollow. First we went on a tour of the Rockefeller Estate. It was beautiful and really interesting to learn about the Rockefellers. The first picture is of the front of the estate.
Then we went to a Halloween celebration in Sleepy Hollow, followed by dinner at Harvest on the Hudson. The restaurant overlooks the Hudson River, and we had a nice table by the fireplace.
On Halloween night, we went to the Van Cortland Manor in Croton-on-the-Hudson where they had the "Blaze" for the whole month of October. There were thousands and thousands of carved pumpkins. It was really amazing to see.

How to Keep Your New Year's Resolutions: Advice from the Experts

2010-01-01T22:14:00.005-05:00

Here's an article from Time magazine today about ways to keep your new year's resolution.

How to Keep Your New Year's Resolutions: Advice from the Experts

Apparently 35% of people who make new year's resolutions, don't even keep them for one day. Who's part of that group?!?!

According to www.usa.gov/Citizen/Topics/New_Years_Resolutions.shtml
here are the top resolutions. Any of these made your list? Let's see if any made my list:

Lose weight - check

Manage Debt - that's I good one, I don't know why I kept it out, I will add it

Save money - I've already been doing that in '09 and will surely keep doing it in 2010

Get a better job - don't think I need to right now, but I would surely take a promotion

Get fit - check, kind of goes hand in hand with losing weight for me

Get a better education - check, in the sense that I want to figure out if I want to or not!

Drink less alcohol - don't need to

Quit smoking - don't need to

Reduce stress overall - I wouldn't say I'm a very stressed person so I don't really need to

Reduce street at work - part of what I like about my job is that it's not stressful, maybe it's the management I have above me, or maybe it's the fact that I have endured unbelievable stress at my prior employer

Take a trip - will do

Volunteer to help others - check

Health-e-cards for the holidays and New Year - had no idea what that meant, so I clicked on the link and they are e-card you can send people from the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to encourage healthy living in the New Year, promote safe activities year -round... check it out www.cdc.gov/Features/Health-e-Cards/

My 10 resolutions for 2010

2010-01-01T21:55:00.006-05:00

Really do I ever keep them????
Anyways, they just make us feel better, so here they are

1- Losing weight - ahah what a shocker, who doesn't have that on their list??

2- Volunteering more - I already lead a team of dog walker at a shelter in Williamsburg once a month, but I really feel like I should do more.

3- Start playing the guitar again - I would really love to be good at it, but like anything in life you need to be patient and practice.

4- Cook new recipes more often - at least once a week I would like to try something new and it's not like we don't have the cookbooks to do it.

5- Make some decisions about my career future - do I want to go back to school? when should I start my own company?...

6- Stop buying clothes just because I have a discount or because it's on sale - that one will be really hard.

7- Watch less TV even if Jr does - somehow I always feel like I have to watch TV when Jr does even if there are many other things I could be doing.

8- Hang out with friends more often - shouldn't be that hard, but it often is!

9- Update this blog more often

10- Manage debt

10 things I look forward to in 2010

2010-01-01T21:41:00.007-05:00

In no particular order (somewhat chronological order)

1- getting my bike - Jr is bying me a bike for Christmas. I don't have it yet because the one I want only comes out in the US in Febrary, but I surely am excited to get it. Here's a picture of it. It's really cool and exactly what I want

2- Jr getting is bonus! I would say mine, but mine won't be anything as big as his!
3- moving in our condo
4- having our own washer and dryer
5- BBQing in the summer on our terrace
6- sunbathing on our private terrace
7- trip to Portugal, South Africa, and France
8- mom and dad's 60th birthday, they are both turning 60 this year
9- another promotion perhaps?!?!
10- another happy year with Jr and our 2 pugs!

Top 9 of '09

2010-01-01T21:11:00.003-05:00

Now that 2009 is over, here are my 9 highlights of '09 (in chronological order)

1- Probably the best highlight of the year and it started the year pretty well in January when Jr got hired permanantly at Wal-Mart. He had been freelancing there for about 6 months, but finally got hired as a full-time employee. That was an awesome news. For those of you who know what we had been going through for the past 2 years, know how much this meant to us.

2- Getting tickets of the 2010 World cup in South Africa and planning the trip. Oh yeah, we never mention that! We applied for tickets to the World cup (which was a lottery) and we actually got tickets for one game. We are trying to get more tickets, but so far so good, we are going to South Africa in June. Here is a short outlook of our 2 weeks trip this summer
3 days in Lisbon, Portugal
3 days in Johannesburg, South Africa
2 days in Krugar Park, South Africa for a safari
1 more day in Johannesburg
6 days in Paris
We are so excited to go. The actual planning of the trip was not so much of a highlight but deciding to go definetely was. As you can imagine with such a big event like the World Cup, everything gets booked up pretty quickly so it was quite a nightmare trying to book everything. But it all worked out in the end, eventhough we are paying at least three times as much as we would have paid had we gone any other time of the year!
okay that was a long highlight!

3- Signing the contract for our condo. Everything happened pretty quickly and it's hard to believe but that was already last April.

4- My promotion at Macy's, but most importantly not losing my job with the merger last May. I was promoted from an assistant planner to an associate planner, now only in Active and Young Contemporary coats.

5- The award I won at work last November for all the hard work I did all throughout the year. Everything started last January when my boss and I had to plan for the entire Missy coat world (back then, we were doing the whole thing, now the area has been split into two). So we had to plan 8 departments and build buy sheets for every programs. We planned such a great assortment for each store that all the stores are so happy with their assortment and they say it's the best it has ever been. Everybody from our manager to the chief of merchandising are very excited about coats this season. And our business was doing so good until the cold never came in November! But since the cold weather decided to show up in December we are doing great again.

6- My sister Marie-Claude visiting me in NYC for the first time in the 8 years I lived here. (see full details below)

7- My trip with my mom in November to Prague and Vienna. (details below)

8- Being picked to be part of the Affinity Resource Team at work. Affinity is a new program we use at work to do our buys and plan each store. Eventually it is supposed to customize the assortment for every single of our 800+ stores based on how well each store sells a particular attribute that has been taged to each style we own. So anyway, one person for each family of business has been picked to represent and support their team. It was pretty cool to find out that it was the GMMs (General Merchandise Manager) and GPMs (General Planning Manager) that picked everyone on the team. Then at our first meeting our CMO (chief merchandise officer) and CPO (chief planning officer) told us that we were cherry picked to be part of this team because they believe we are the future leaders of the company. I thought that was pretty cool!
Also the team is mostly buyers and planners, but very few associate planners and associate buyers.

9- Finally but not least, my Green Card got renewed for another 10 years, so I won't be going anywhere for now. When I first got my Green Card, it was a conditional Green Card for 2 years because Jr and I were married for less than 2 years when we applied, so after 2 years, they want to check up on you and make sure you're still married.

Mom's travel

2010-01-01T21:04:00.003-05:00

Other than going on trips with her 3 daughters, it seems like my mom was been out of the country more than she's been home this past year. To start back from Christmas last year, she spent
one month in Florida between December and January
one week in Vegas in April (I think)
then onto her trip with M-C to California for another week
one week in Croatia in June
that lead into one week in England
that lead into one week in Russia with Gen
one week in Israel in September
One week in Prague and Vienna with me in December
and then again one more month in Florida this December/January
You do the math, that's a lot of traveling in 12 months! Lucky her, right?
She said she wanted to stay home this coming summer, let's see how much of that will happen!

Prague and Vienna

2010-01-01T19:50:00.008-05:00

My mom retired from teaching in June 2008 and one of her retirement project was to take all three of her daughters on a trip alone with her. First my older sister Marie-Claude chose to go to California, then my middle sister Gen chose to go to Russia, and finally my mom and I chose to go to Prague and Vienna together. We went from Thanksgiving weekend to the first week of December for a total of 10 days. We had a great time and both cities were beautiful. Prague is more medieval and Vianna is more like Paris. It was very interesting to learn the history of both cities, from the impact of the Holocaust to the Hofburg Empire, to the classical history of musician like Mozart. We experiences various entertainement in both cities. In Prague we went to the opera Carmen, which is actually a french opera but it was so hard to understand that I ended up reading the english subtitles! In Vienna we went to the Swan Lake ballet, a classical concert from the Wiener Philharmoniker (Vienna Philharmonic) orchestra, considered one of the finest in the world, and finally we went to the Spanish Riding School at the Hofburg Palace to see the world famous Lipizzaner stalions perform. Everything was amazing.
Here are a few pictures, I tried to limit them to 20.

View of Prague at night from Prague castle

St.Vitus's cathedral inside Prague castle

A view going down from Prague castle

Prague castle with the famous Charles Bridge

Day view of the city from Prague Castle

The famous astronomical clock in Prague

Christmas market in Prague

View of Prague from tower

Christmas market in Prague

St. Vitus's cathedral, I liked the gargoyle all around the cathedral

Again St. Vitus's cathedral inside Prague castle

Another view of Prague

The Jewish cemetary in Prague

Our bedroom in Vienna, just like a Palace!

Schonbrunn palace in Vienna, it's the summer residence of the Habsburg's family

Hofburg palace

One of the many Christmas market in Vienna, in front of City Hall

Stephansdom's cathedral in Vienna

Mozarthaus, yes it was Mozart's house

Spanish Riding School inside the Horgurg Palace

Rock of Ages ROCKS

2010-01-01T19:39:00.004-05:00

Last October or November, one of our vendor at work took us out for dinner and to see the musical Rock Of Ages. It was absolutely awesome and we had so much fun. There was 6 of us, all pretty young girls and we just loved it. Our vendor had actually seen it once or twice before she took us, but she loved it so much she wanted to take us.
The musical is about a young rocker from the 80's that's looking for love. It's very cliche and quite vulgar. I highly recommend it to anyone who wants to laugh plenty, is open to inappropriate jokes, and loves 80's rock. Not the kind of musical you want to take your parents to though!
Constantine from Americal Idol was the lead guy and after the show was over, my vendor and I were waiting together for our car service to show up and the actors started coming out of the theater and we were lucky enough to get our picture taken with Constantine, or I should say he took a picture of us with my Blackberry!

M-C comes to NYC

2010-01-01T19:17:00.003-05:00

So I've been living in NYC for the past 8 years (hard to believe), moved 6 times, at one point spent up to 50% of my net salary on rent, had a total of 7 rooommates in the past 8 years and yet my older sister Marie-Claude had never made it down to NYC to witness any of it... until this fall. She came to visit us in NYC for the first time in 8 years. She of course had been to NYC before, but never to crash at our place like other siblings and friends have done.
In November she and her new boyfriend (that I was meeting for the first time) came for a short weekend. They had a good time, and so did we, and she promised to come back more often. After all why wouldn't you if you have a place to stay for free in NYC???
Can't wait to have you over again.

All about Park Slope

2010-01-01T16:45:00.003-05:00

I've never lived in Brooklyn before and neither has Jr., but when we were looking at the different neighborhoods I fell in love with Park Slope. To some degrees I like it more than any neighborhoods in Manhattan. Park Slope is very family-oriented, all the streets are tree-lined, there is a huge park (Prospect Park) designed by the same architect that did Central Park, it's a small neighborhood with tons of mom and pop business. Honestly I could count on the fingers of my hand the number of chain businesses, everything is unique restaurants and boutiques. Park Slope, and Brooklyn as a whole, is a very "green" and hyppie neighbornood with tons of farmers markets.
Sounds pretty perfect to me!
As we discover more of Park Slope I will report my findings...

It's been too long again!

2010-01-01T16:16:00.012-05:00

Well it's been another 6 months since we've updated our blog. I'm on the computer all day at work so when I get home at night I rarely turn on the computer. But today Jr is watching 3 bowl games in a row and it's really boring!
We haven't been up to anything too much different since last August. No we still haven't moved in our new condo. After having been told the middle of September, then the end of November, we are now looking at April-May. We are still excited about it and are looking forward to the day we actually get to live there. Until then we are still in Queens and can't wait to move out of here! We talked about buying a condo earlier in our blog, but we didn't go into too much details about it. It's a one bedroom, one bathroom condo with a private terrace and our very own washer and dryer, I can't wait! Here are some of the rendering pictures.

This is the kitchen, obviously!

This is the living area with our private terrace of 120 sq. feet

That's a picture of the whole building

The lobby with fireplace!!

The shared terrace

Federrer vs Niemeyer

2009-08-12T21:56:00.004-04:00

Last weekend Jr and I went to Montreal for my aunt's funeral. She passed away on Friday night of cancer. We left New York very early Saturday morning and we just came back to New York tonight.
Last night my sister, Marie-Claude, invited us to a tennis match in Montreal. It was the Rogers Cup tournament and her friend, Frederic Niemeyer was playing against Federrer. It was a good match, even though Federrer is #1, Niemeyer gave him a good challenge, or at least what it looked like one.

Vader's birthday

2009-08-12T21:44:00.003-04:00

The night of Vader's birthday, August 6th, I was making red velvet cupcakes for one of my co-worker's baby shower at work and I made 2 little cupcakes for Yoda and Vader to celebrate Vader's birthday. Vader was really happy, look at his face and tongue! Yoda didn't mind it too much either!

Dog pictures

2009-08-12T21:34:00.005-04:00

The pugs in their favorite places:

Yoda and Vader enjoying their new large Wal-Mart bed that they can share without pushing each other

Vader in the toy basket sleeping or eating the basket, waiting for us by the door

Yoda and Vader waiting for Jr to be done showering

BBQ in Prospect Park

2009-08-12T21:24:00.003-04:00

A couple weekends ago we went to Prospect Park in Brooklyn to have a little bbq. I love bbq so one night that I felt like eating some, I went to Target to buy a small portable bbq and the next night we made some hamburger on the fire escape. That's New York lifestyle! So a couple weekends ago we went to Prospect Park on Saturday afternoon to have hamburger and hot dogs for lunch. It was really good. Prospect Park is the park close to where we bought our condo in Park Slope, Brooklyn. There is also a dog beach in the park, we took the pugs there and the water was really cold so I thought that Yoda would go in right away, but he was a little scared of stepping on the rocks underwater. Once they get used to it they will have lots of fun there!

Mets game

2009-08-12T21:22:00.001-04:00

Mets game at the new CitiField. We went with Alyson when she was visiting in July. We ate ShakeShack for dinner mmmmmmm...

July 4th weekend

2009-08-12T20:40:00.006-04:00

Wow, we're almost up to date on our blog. I will make a valid effort to try to update this as soon as possible.

For July Fourth weekend, Jr and I took a couple day off. We left New York, with the pugs, on Wednesday night June 30, for Montreal. The next day, on July 1, it was Canada day. We went to Ottawa, Canada's capital, with my friend Marie. We saw the change of guard in front of the parlement and then they had the Royal Canadian Mounted Police performed their carousel show. It was really nice, I had seen it before in Sasketchewan, but it was Jr's first time to see it. Then we listen to the little concert they had in front of the parlement.

On Friday night we picked up Alyson at the airport, she was visiting us for a week.

Jr holding the Vancouver 2010 Olympic torch

On the 4th at night I had invited a few friends over for a bbq for Independance Day in Canada! Jr and Alyson cooked everything on the bbq and I made some red velvet cupcakes. I wasn't very nice outside that night and it was quite cold so we had to eat inside but it was still fun. My friends all brought their kids so there was 7 kids!

Then there are pictures of me swimming with the pugs, they were really hot outside so I took them in the water, without Jr again!

This is Jr running around the pool with the 2 pugs and my parents' cocker spaniel, Mozart, and Marie's french bulldog, Olive, all running after him.

Dog park

2009-08-12T20:32:00.004-04:00

Jr and the pugs at the dog park where we used to take Yoda everyday when we lived in the financial district. It's pretty sad, but it was Vader's first time at a dog park. He behaved very good, no crazyness and most of all no bites from another dog. The first time took Yoda there when he was a puppy, he got bit by a big dog and he actually had his skin pierced on the neck. I miss that dog park, it's really nice because it's pavement so it doesn't stink and it has a little dog pool so they can get wet when they are hot. Before that we had taken them to Central Park, so it was a big day for the pugs!

Caroline's high school reunion

2009-08-12T19:53:00.003-04:00

Last May, I went to my 10 year high school reunion in Rigaud, outside Montreal. I went to high school there for 5 years, which is the full high school in Quebec. It was nice to see the school again and all the people I was friends. I was a little nervous at first that I wouldn't remember someone or forget someone's name, but I didn't do too bad. We watched a diaporama and a video of when we were at school, it was really funny.
The next day I had a few friends over at my house for brunch. I was good to be all together again.

Easter

2009-08-12T19:00:00.005-04:00

For Easter weekend, my sister, Genevieve, and my friend, Marie, came to visit. We had already planned to make hats for the Easter parade on Fifth Avenue. For those who are not familiar with New York's Easter parade tradition, on Easter Sunday, on Fifth Avenue, people walk around with interesting hats that they usually made themselves. It's not really a parade, but the street is closed and people walk up and down showing or looking at everybody's hat. The day before the parade, we went to a craft store, Michael's, and we bought all kinds of stuff to make our hats. Mine was like a giant nest with small birds on it. Marie's was basket with flowers, artificial AND fresh!, and birds and buterflies. Gen's was a cowboy hat with glittered rabbit ears sticking out. We had a lot of fun making them and certainly showing them off. It really weird when we walked down the street, everybody wants to take pictures, not only of your hat, but with you. You can see that Jr is not on the pictures, that's not because he didn't want us to take pictures of him, that's because he didn't want to make a hat and come with us!
On Easter morning, Gen made us all brunch, it was really good.

Cherry Blossoms in Washington D.C.

2009-08-12T18:37:00.003-04:00

In April we went to Washington D.C. to see the cherry blossoms. It was BEAUTIFUL. I been wanting to go for many years and this year we decided to go. I had been to Washington D.C. once before about 15 years ago, but it was Jr. first time. We didn't go inside anywhere because as you can see from the pictures we brought our pugs with us; we can't go anywhere without them! We stayed in a Motel 6 about 5 minutes from the Capitol because that's one place we knew take dogs! We left on Saturday morning hoping to get there around noon but we were stuck in rediculous traffic all the way there. Instead of taking us 4 hours it took us about 6 or 7 hours. When we got there in the afternoon, we checked in a the motel and we parked near the capitol and we walked from there all the way to the end of the mall where the most of the cherry blossoms were and the Jefferson memorial was. Then we walked all the way back to the car, by then it was night already. On our way back to the motel we stopped at a Thai restaurant and got some take-out to take back to the motel. The next day, we drove and parked near the White House and we walked around the grounds there for a little bit and we had Cosi for lunch on a picnic table right outside the White House. I mention Cosi because that's when my severe addiction started! Since then I can't get enough of it, whenever I can, I get it for lunch at work. I love their turkey and brie sandwich and their signature salad, mmmmm.Anyway, after lunch we left and drove back to New York. It was a short trip and we stayed outside for most of it but it was fun and a change from the New York scenery.

Christmas season

2009-08-05T21:24:00.008-04:00

During Christmas, Jr and I and the pugs drove down to Florida to meet my parents and sisters. On Christmas Eve, my mom prepared a Christmas Eve little meal at midnight the same way my grand -mother used to do when my mom was little. Then on Christmas day we did a gift exchange, that was my idea, we all bought a $5 gift for everyone else and when we opened the gifts we had to guess how had bought it for us. It was a lot of fun, and it would have been even better if my dad didn't send my mom to buy his gifts for him!
On my birthday we went to a hockey game, the Canadiens were playing against the Florida Panthers and of course they beat them. It was pretty fun because at least half of the arena was people from Quebec.
On New Year's Eve we went to Miami for dinner at Joes' Stone Crab and we actually waited 3 hours for a table. Not that they told us it was going to be 3 hours annd it ended up being an hour and a half, we actually waited THREE hours!! It wasn't such a big deal because we wanted to watched the fireworks that set off from the ocean on the beach so we would have had to wait for that anyway, but by the time we sat down and we finished dinner we rushed to the beach and we pretty much missed the whole thing. We still had fun afterwards, everyone was partying in the street on Ocean Drive.
Then on New Years day we went to the Orange Bowl at the Miami Dolphins stadium. I suggested that we tailgate before the game, since we, Canadians, are not big football fans and we never experienced this tailgating thing! So my parents bought a small protable grill and we brought hot dogs and all kinds of tailgating foods. We were with a few family friends and we all had a lot of fun. The game however wasn't really exciting and the stadium was barely half full.
Other than that we did the usual in Florida, beach, shop and eat out.

Tailgate party at the Orange Bowl

We always get a picture of the tree at Rockefeller Center

The beach...

Yoda and Vader in their "dog park", made by my parents, in Florida

The Canadians playing against the Florida Panthers on my birthday!

All the "quebequers" cellebrating after the Montreal Canadians won the hockey game

The Orange Bowl at the Miami Dolphins Stadium

Orange Bowl

Thanksgiving Day Parade

2009-08-05T19:31:00.009-04:00

Our last Thanksgiving was different than probably any of you had it before, we were part of the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade. Working at Macy's I can participate in any of the positions available in the parade, baloon handler, clown, float escort, costumer... and marshall, which is what I was doing. I was a marshall for the parade and Jr was my recruit, so in other words my assistant! We were responsible to make sure the parade went smoothly between our 10 blocks of responsibility. If the parade was slowing down we had to tell people to speed up, if it was going to fast we had to tell them to slow down, if somebody got injured we had to help them and many more very important tasks!!! It was a lot of fun and luckyly nothing big happened in our section.
Alyson and Helen watched the parade from the Grandstands and Ron was hanging out with the pugs back at our apartment.
After the parade we cooked a traditional Thanksgiving day meal, which actually made me sick, I threw up during the night and I didn't want to call in sick the Friday after Thanksgiving because I though that it would look too fake so I went to work, but my manager could tell I was sick just looking at me, so I went back home!
On the Saturday we went to the outlet mall at Woodburry Common and went a little too crazy, it was hard to resist all those "black Saturday" specials.
Overall we had a great weekend and we hope it can be repeated this year.

Me in my Marshall outfit!

Forum Retreat

2009-08-05T19:01:00.004-04:00

FYI, the last 2 posts should have been inverted in order!

In November I had my YAF (Young Adult Forum) retreat with people I meet with every month to talk about our personal, family and business lives. Once a year we are supposed to go on a retreat for a few days. I've been in my forum for about 3 years, but that was the first one we did. We went to a house we rented for one night in Pennsylvania. We had a lot of fun even though it was short and we didn't get to go to exotic places like our parents' forum retreats! We haven't decided where we're going to go this year, but we are thinking of maybe going at some point around January or February. Here are some pictures of our night.

One Year later...

2009-08-05T18:37:00.003-04:00

Well it has been almost a year since we last updated this thing so I think that it is time to do so. We have pictures that will show things that we have been up to since then. Other than that it is basically the same Jr and I go to work and then take care of the dogs when we get home. I am still working at Macy's as an associate planner in womens coats and Jr is working at Wal-mart as a boy's designer for the brand Faded Glory. Life is good in our careers right now. I guess the big news is that Jr and I are in the process of buying a condo in Brooklyn, NY (its not as scary as it sounds and no, it's not the Bronx) We are just waiting for the building to finish construction before we can close on the condo and move in. We are really excited and can't wait to have a place that is all ours. Other than that life is good and things are going really well for us. So since last year, after we went to Philly, here's what we've been up to...our first set of photos is from last fall in september when Alyson came to visit and we took the dogs up to the Adirondaks to go hiking and pick some apples.

Jr's Birthday and our anniversary

2009-08-02T19:43:00.014-04:00

In October we flew to SLC for a week to celebrate our aniversary and Jr's 30th birthday. For our anniversary we went to eat at La Caille which was really nice and a beautiful night for a special occasion. Helen, Alyson, Jr, and myself then drove down to Bryce Canyon and Zions and drove through those parks and see all that there is to see there. We also had a chance Alyson, Jr, and myself to go horse back riding through the canyons at Bryce. We then picked up Ron at St George airport and continued our travel on to Las Vegas to celebrate Jr's birthday. We all stayed at the Luxor and enjoyed the sites and sounds of Vegas. We all went to dinner for Jr's birthday at a really nice Mexican resturant and then Jr's and I went to see the Chriss Angel show Believe at the Luxor. Jr is a big Chriss Angel fan and was really excited to go. It was a good show although he had seen a lot of the illusions that he did before, but the story was really neat and the Cirque Du Soleil performance and costumes were amazing. So overall it was a really fun 30th Birthday week for him and myself.

Philly

2008-08-12T14:14:00.004-04:00

Over the weekend Caroline and I decided to take a day trip to Philly to just see the city and go to Independence Hall and Liberty Bell National Park.

It is a 2 hour drive so we were able to go there in the morning and come back at night, the drive is not bad the long part is getting off this crazy island called Manhattan.

Once we got there we got in line to see the liberty bell, it was really neat to see it up close and the fact that it was not encased made it even cooler.

We both were hungry so we could not go to Philly without having a famous Philly Cheese stake. We went to a place that I had seen on Throw down with Bobby Flay. The place was Tony Luke's, and the cheese steaks were great. Really big and tasty, Caroline could not finish hers and I was not going to attempt to finish it off for here there were just too big.

We headed back to Independence Hall, they give you a reserved ticket time to go through the site so that there are not too many people going through. We took the tour of the complex of buildings that are there and learned about the history and the significance of these buildings. It was a really neat thing to finally see some of the history that I had learned about all of my life. Normally as Americans we don't realize our own history because our history is not very old, but it was so cool to see the birth place of the United States of America and to really get a sense of how amazing that history is. I am a big history buff so this was very exciting for me and so much fun to be where the Declaration of Independence was signed and to actually see a "copy" of it from 1776.

Philly was so much fun, it is a beautiful city and had a really fun vibe about it, we will definitely have to go back again and spent some more time there. It was a good day trip to learn about history and eat some good. It is so nice to get out of Manhattan with all of the running around that goes on here and to slow it down a bit. Hopefully we can go to many of the other great cities on the east coast.

The pictures are of Independence Hall, the room where the Declaration was signed. the senate and house chambers. and the Liberty Bell.

PUG

2008-08-12T13:59:00.002-04:00

Since it has been awhile since I put pictures of our dogs up here I though that I would now. As you can see Vader has got a lot bigger than before, he is now taller than Yoda, but not quite as big as Yoda. They both are crazy and have way too much fun chasing and annoying each other.

Met's Game

2008-08-12T13:48:00.004-04:00

OK so it has been awhile since the last time that we updated this blog.

Here are some pictures of Caroline and I at a Met's game we were able to go down on the field because it was a special thing that Macy's was doing with the heart association. The game itself was a bit uneventful, but it was fun to be there and we had a good time.

2008-02-18T18:00:00.004-05:00

Quebec City

2008-02-18T17:13:00.003-05:00

For Valentines day Caroline and I went to Quebec City for the Winter Carnival that is held there every year. It was extra special this year because Quebec is celebrating its 400th B-day. We left on Valentines day, so we actually celebrated it the next day. We drove to Montreal and stayed with Caroline's parents for the night and dropped the dogs off with them. The dogs didnt mind because they have the freedom to run like crazy in Caroline's house. Early the next morning we drove to Quebec city which is a little over 2 hours away. We got there and checked into our awesome hotel. For anyone who has seen pictures of Quebec City than you probably have see the hotel that we stayed in Le Chateau Frontenac. It is abeautiful hotel that is over a hundred years old and designed like an old Chateau from France. Our room was in the tall tower on the top floor so it was really nice and had such an amazing view of Old Quebec. We bundled up the temp. was around 20 degrees on that day, and headed out to see the sites and the Carnival. We went to the Ice Castle that is the home for the mascott of the Carnival a giant snowman called "Bonhomme". We got our picture taken with him and we were able to go around and look at all of the ice and snow sculptures that are made by different students and countries for the Carnival. It was really pretty and fun. There was not a lot of activities that were planned for that day, but there were many for tomorrow. We were out for about 4 hours walking around and by that time we were done we were so cold we went back to our hotel room and sat in the jacuzzi hot tub for awhile so we could get warm again. That night we had our Valentines day a romantic dinner in the 5 star French resturant Le Champlain. The atmosphere was so nice, it was like in a big living room with a large fire place and a view overlooking the river. The food was fantastic and so good and the desserts were amazing. It was a really nice time and a very romantic Valentines dinner.

The next day it was cold and I mean really cold, the high temprature for the day was to get to only 5 degrees and to feel a lot colder because of the wind. We went to all of the different venues that had things to do like ice skating, tubing, sleding, and other various activities that you could watch or participate. At one place they had an Ice Bath where people could take a bath in the snow with just their bathing suits on, absolutly crazy in that temprature. We watched some horse and sleigh races which was fun, but again it was so cold that I could hardly believe that the horses were having any fun. We had a traditional Quebec meal for lunch a split pea soup and a beef stew like meal. It was good because it was able to warm you up from the inside. Again it was so cold that we went back to our room and sat in the jacuzzi to warm up because we were going to go out at night and watch the night parade. We left to go see the night parade at 6 and at that time it was about -20 degrees F and with the wind about -30. We had camped out at the end of the parade route which was probably a mistake because we waited for about 3 and a half hours before the parade got there. There were a lot of people there so that helped the temprature go up a degree or two. The only way to keep warm was to dance around and keep moving. The parade was fun by the time it got there and it was really fun to see all of the floats and all of the fun stuff that they had. And of course Bonhomme was there in the last float to say goodbye and thanks for comming and he would see everyone next year. We then tried to walk back to the hotel, it was hard because we were so cold and could hardly move. And again we cooked in the jacuzzi and ordered hot coco and desserts. And that was all of our awesome Valentines Day weekend. We got up the next morning and said goodbye to Quebec City and drove back to Montreal picked up the dogs and drove back here to NYC. All in all it was a great weekend.

Rockefeller center Christmas tree

2008-02-18T16:57:00.002-05:00

Christmas

2008-02-18T16:44:00.005-05:00

Christmas

2008-02-18T16:42:00.002-05:00

We had a great Christmas and a lot of fun just the 2 of us. Throughout the month of December we had several of our family members come and visit with us and it was really fun to have them here at this time of year.

Temple Sealing

2008-02-18T16:23:00.001-05:00

Temple Sealing

2008-02-18T08:52:00.003-05:00

So Caroline and I were sealed in the Salt Lake City Temple on the 27th of October of last year. It was an amazing experience that we had waited for. It was so nice to have friends and family there to support us in the sealing room. It was a beautiful sealing with a lot of love and good advice spoken to all of us. We were both so excited to be there.
We were able to have a dinner afterwards with friends and family. We had dinner in the Joseph Smith Building in one of the rooms that overlooked the temple, it was such a beautiful room for a wonderful occasion. It was very special to have friends and family there to support and celebrate with us. It was also so nice to have Carolines parents and her 2 sisters there, who flew in from Montreal. Their love and support of Caroline and her decisions means the world to me. It was an amazing time that would not have been possible without Caroline and my parents love and support. Thanks mom and dad.

Thanksgiving parade

2007-11-28T18:23:00.000-05:00

Thanksgiving dinner

2007-11-28T18:18:00.000-05:00

Thanksgiving

2007-11-28T17:52:00.000-05:00

Well I just kind of skipped over thanksgiving without telling about how it went. We were able to actually get tickets to sit in the stands for the Macy's parade so that was really cool. I have seen the parade several times in person and have seen the balloons fill up several times as well, but let we tell you nothing compares to being able to sit and really enjoy the parade. It was nice to not have to worry about being crushed by the masses of people that are there or about not being able to see anything except for the balloons. We were in great seats and it was really really cool, I will put a few pics of the parade. We then just made our way back to our apartment were we began the preparations for the big meal. For all those city people that enjoy going to a restaurant to have a thanksgiving meal, boy you are crazy. I always went to my grandmas or my mom made a big meal for thanksgiving, there is something special when you can make it yourself and it really means something. It was just Caroline and I, but it sure was fun and we had a really good time getting it all ready. We were even able to break out our fine china for the first time which was really cool as well. In the end is was a fantastic meal, the food was amazing and the leftovers are still being consumed. Ill put a pic of the spread that we had. So overall Thanksgiving was a great holiday spent here in our home with my wonderful wife, how can you beat that right?

2007-11-28T17:35:00.000-05:00

Life

2007-11-27T23:54:00.000-05:00

Well it is already past Thanksgiving and on the way to Christmas, time flys by really fast these days. It has been awhile since either one of us has written on here. Caroline is loving her new job at Macy's, and is doing very well. We just got a new addition to our family on Sunday. No not a child we are still not crazy enough to have one of those, but we are crazy enough to buy another dog. For all of those who really know us, we love pugs and I have always wanted to have 2 pugs one that is a fawn color which we have and another one that is black which we just got. I have always wanted to have Yoda and Vader and so we now we finally have our little star wars family and if we do get another one in the future it will be a Brussels Griffon that we will name Chewbacca. Yeah I kind of like Star Wars. It is fun to have them. Well life out here in Queens is great I was so tired of living in the Canyons of the financial district and in Manhattan that is is really nice to get out and to see the suburbs of New York. Our apartment is great all of the comforts of home. We have been able to furnish it up really nice and it feels so much more like and actual family home rather than just a space that we are occupying for a year. The holiday season is really nice it is such a fun time of year to set up your tree and to really decorate the place for Christmas. Stockings are up, the tree is decorated, the nativity is out and all of the sweet smells of cinnamon and pine are filling the air. What a great time of year.
It has been rather busy here in the apartment over the last month with friends and family visiting from Montreal. It has been great to actually have people over and not to worry where they are going to stay and if I have enough cushions for them to sleep on. That mixed in with all of the sports that have been going on over the last month on the weekends it is crazy. With all of the games that are on I need another TV to watch them all (the 2nd TV is coming soon).
Well as for me I am still looking for a job, I have been looking since may so that is a bit rough. It is really hard to keep going and going to interviews and hearing the same thing time and time again...sorry we went with the other guy who had a little more experience than you.... It is hard to get up the faith and the belief that it will really happen and that I will finally get hired. But other than being unemployed life is good. Not any thing else to complain about really I guess, just not having a job. That's about all I can think of right now.

GMAT

2007-10-08T17:53:00.000-04:00

I finally took my appointment to take the GMAT test (for graduate business school) this Friday October 12. I'm really scared; I've been putting this off for more than 4 months. I took a series of prep class from february through april and since then I just couldn't get myself to set up a time to take the test. I kept saying that I wasn't ready, well I'll never be ready so I might as well do it now. I hope I won't be too dissapointed with my score. I can always take it again, but it costs $250 every time, so after 2 or 3 times it becomes a little expensive.
I'll study hard until friday and do my best.

New apartment...New furniture

2007-10-08T17:48:00.000-04:00

A few days after moving in our new apartment, we went shopping for furniture. We bought a sleeper sofa and a reclining chair set, a dining table and chairs and a new king size mattress. Our mattress is being delivered tonight, so I'm really excited to test it out and say bye bye to the full size bed! Our sofa and recliner are being delivered on wednesday, so after that our living room / dining room will be all done; we'll just have to hang all our frames on the walls. We will post pictures as soon as everything is finished.

New apartment

2007-10-03T00:12:00.000-04:00

Well we finally got everything all moved in and settled down a bit yesterday. It was an extremely long day, but at least it is all over now. The new place is great and the space is very nice. I actually forgot what it was like to live in a real apartment that is meant to be lived in not just slept in. We are both really sore from all of the lifting and all of the bending down. I guess one of the really neat things was that this morning I could actually see the sun rise something that I have not seen for the last 2 years due to the lack of windows in our apartment, it was oh so nice. We will post some pictures of the place as soon as we get it all sorted out.

I have a job!

2007-09-28T17:28:00.000-04:00

Today I was offered a job as the Assistant Planner for Macy's East. For those who don't know what that means, basically the Planner looks at past record of sales and advises the buyer on what sold and what didn't sell and how much money the buyer can spend. The Assistant Planner does the allocations, so I would decide how much of what the buyer bought goes to each store, again looking back at the previous years numbers.
I'm super excited, it's something I wanted to do when I graduated and I always wanted to work for what used to be Federated, now Macy's Inc.
I start on October 15 and I can't wait.

Blog Blog Blog

2007-09-25T01:44:00.000-04:00

I've been blogging a lot in the past two days, I wanted to kind of give a background and put it up to date before I give people the link. I hope I don't get too addicted to this!

Mets game

2007-09-25T01:41:00.000-04:00

Tonight we went to the Mets baseball game with poeple from church. It was fun to be there but the game was terrible, the Mets lost by I think like 9 points. We went with a friend of ours (Natalie) from college, so it was nice to catch up with her.

New apartment

2007-09-25T01:36:00.000-04:00

Well today we officially signed our lease for our new apartment in Elmhurst, Queens.
We hope to have lots of visitor eventhough we will be outside Manhattan!
Our move date is October 1st.
It will be very different, both Jr and I have always lived in Manhattan for the last 6 years.
A new experience I guess.

Summer outings in or around New York

2007-09-25T01:12:00.000-04:00

When we didn't get out of New York State, we tried to still go out and do some things. We went to the Red Bull soccer game when David Backham was playing in New York, we went to a Yankees game, we went to pick apple upstate, we went to the Woodbury Outlet... and a bunch of other fun stuff like that!

Super hot David Beckham

Giant Stadium full of people who came to see David Beckham

Yankees game

Apple picking

Alyson, Jr.'s sister

mmmmm

Summer trips outside New York

2007-09-25T00:09:00.000-04:00

So this past summer we tried to get out of the city as much as we could. There comes a point when the island of Manhattan is just suffocating. We couldn't leave the country until I got my green card approved (August 14) so in May we went to Florida for a few days during Memorial day weekend. In July we went boating with my family in Burlington, Vermont. Then after my green card was approved, we went to Montreal and Quebec City. Jr and I had been to Quebec City together before but it was during the winter and the coldest week of the winter, so it was nice to go back in the summer and actually be able to get out of the car without getting icicle in our nose.

FLORIDA

Versace's mansion on Ocean Drive in Miami

Jr. on the beach

Caroline on the beach!

Jr.'s sunburn after not putting on sunscreen the first day in the sun

Caroline in the process of putting on sunscreen

BURLINGTON

Putting the boat out in Burlington

Yoda getting his life vest on

Boating!

QUEBEC CITY

Small street in Old Quebec City

Jr. shooting a canon

Old Quebec City

Jr. eating a beaver tail, his favorite treat in Canada

Chateau Frontenac at night

Montmorrency waterfall

Full view of the waterfall, which is actually taller than the Niagara Falls

Wedding reception - Burlington, Vermont

2007-09-24T01:42:00.000-04:00

February 24, 2007

Yoda the pug

2007-09-24T00:36:00.000-04:00

We love our pug, so we have tons and tons of pictures of him.

Yoda on his first day home

Yoda after being neutured

Yoda sleeping on his back, his favorite sleeping position

Yoda the soccer player, he is really good, not kidding

Again with his favorite toy

Ready to go out in his rugby shirt and puffy vest, he has a lot of clothes!

At the dog park

Yoda in his life vest boating in Burlington, Vermont

Playing at the dog park

Pictures from our wedding

2007-09-24T00:19:00.000-04:00

Here are some pictures from our wedding, in Central Park.

Flash back

2007-09-24T00:02:00.001-04:00

For those who don't know us very well or know little about us, here is a little background of our lives together. To find out more about each of us personally, check out the section "About Us" on the right.
We met at the Fashion Institute of Technology in New York in september 2002; we were on the same floor in the co-ed dorms. Being pretty much the only straight guy on the floor, I jumped on him! Just kidding. Those of you who know me, you know I wouldn't do that! My two roommates and I became friends with Jr. We hung out, ate and did pretty much everthing together.
The attraction between us began to develop more, I would say, towards the end of the fall 2002 semester, but it was only when we got back from the Christmas break that we started dating.
After we moved out from the dorms at the end of the Spring semester, we each moved into a different apartment with roommate(s) but only a few streets from each other, so we could see each other every single day!
In may 2005, I (Caroline) moved downtown into a much cooler and bigger apartment (20 John Street), but so far from Jr. (about 15 minutes on the subway)! The commute between us was so unbearable that Jr. and Cary (his brother) moved on my street downtown (99 John Street). Then we were happy to live only a few buildings away from each other.
So we dated for three and a half years until we decided to get married. Jr. proposed on a romantic walk on the Brooklyn Bridge, overlooking our neighborhood. I said YES!
We got married on October 14, 2006 in New York City with only our immediate family present; it was a very intimate ceremony. I also got baptised on the same day too.
In February 2007, we had a ring exchange ceremony and reception in Burlington, Vermont. We had to plan the October wedding quickly for immigration purposes, and then until February we had more time to plan for the big extravaganza!
On October 27, 2007 we are getting sealed in the Salt Lake City temple.