Cardon Stories: Life Has Been Busy

It has been quite a while since we have updated our blog. Overall, things are about like normal – not too many exciting things have happened. Things are going pretty well for Aimee and I. Aimee’s semester is almost over and so far her grades are looking really good. Her work is also going well, although every day can be a challenge. My work is also going well. I am starting a photography class next week, so that should be fun.
Last month I went to Chicago for a work conference. This was the first time I have visited Chicago and it was a larger city than I expected. It wasn’t a long trip but I did get to see some of the sights.

It was rainy for several of the days. The clouds were so low some of the taller buildings actually disappeared into the clouds.

While walking around the city I visited Millennium Park. In the park I took a look at Cloud Gate, a large curved reflective sculpture. It was rainy but it was a fun place to take a picture.

On the way home the clouds from the airplane were really nice looking. I thought it was worth a picture.
A few weeks ago Aimee and I visited the Air and Space museum in Chantilly. We have been to the museum in DC but this is the first time we have gone to the one in Chantilly. The museum was HUGE, it was literally an enormous warehouse full of airplanes.

In addition to having a lot of planes, the museum also had a space shuttle. The shuttle is called the Enterprise and was one of the first shuttles NASA built. It didn’t ever take-off, but it was used for atmospheric tests. It was a lot bigger than I expected.

You can get a sense of how big it is when you see how big it looks compared to Aimee.

Here is a picture of me by a cool looking plane.
While we don’t like living so far away from our families, we really do love springtime in DC. The weather is great and almost every tree in the area blossoms. Every year we have living in the area we have gone to the cherry blossom festival and this year was no exception. This year we went with our friends Eric and Stephanie. We decided to drive into the city rather than metro and luckily we had no problem finding a parking spot. The weather was really nice and we got some great pictures.

Here is a really nice one of Aimee with the cherry blossoms in the background.

We made it a little later in the season this year and the blossoms were more white than pink, but they were still really nice.

Here is a close-up on a few of the blossoms. Some of these still had pink tinges.

On the walk back I took this picture. I thought it turned out really nice.
A couple weekends ago we got a call from Marci, one of Aimee’s coworkers. Every year for two days the White House gives out tickets to tour its gardens. The tickets are hard to get and normally people have to wait in line for a long time to get them. Luckily, Marci had a few extra tickets and invited Aimee and I to go with her and her son. It was really cool and the tour was self-paced so we we were able to spend as much time as we wanted exploring the gardens.
On the way into the gardens we were greeted by guards holding machine guns.

These guys look like they mean business. You can see the clip of bullets on the top of the gun.

Here is a picture of all four of us in the backyard.

Here is a dog bowl at the back of the White House – in case the Obama’s dog gets hungry.

There is a nice view from the backyard. It is a lot bigger than it looks.

Here is the vegetable garden. It sure did look nice, especially considering that it had been cold for about a week before the garden tour.

As we were leaving Aimee got this great picture of the tulip garden.
Two weeks ago Aimee and I decided we needed a vacation (technically we decided it a while ago). We went down to Key Largo, FL to visit Aimee’s sister Stacie and her family. She just had a baby, Sam, 20 days before we visited so we got to spend some good time with the new baby. We also got a few good days on the beach and went snorkeling on a coral reef. It was a great trip and a much needed vacation. Here are a few of the highlights:

Stacie and Tony’s condo association has a private beach. It was fun to take Eric and Paige down to the beach. They also had a golf cart, which Aimee had a lot of fun driving.

Here is a good one of Aimee and Paige by the golf cart right on the edge of the ocean.

Here is an ultimate “on vacation” shot.

They had a really nice beach.

Aimee holding baby Sam. :)
Here are a few other random things that have happened to us recently:
1. Aimee got a new Kindle for grad school and a padded bag to keep it safe