“I expect to pass through life but once. If therefore, there be any kindness I can show, or any good thing I can do to any fellow being, let me do it now, and not defer or neglect it, as I shall not pass this way again.” - William Penn
This weekend, Chris and I met in the middle of NYC and Baltimore in Philadelphia. We walked all over the city and checked out the National Constitution Center, Independence Hall, and the Liberty Bell, just to name a few.
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| Display in the museum housing the Liberty Bell. |
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| National Constitution Center |
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| Independence Hall |
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| The Liberty Bell |
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| The tree in Rittenhouse Square |
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| Funky art house on South Street |
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| We couldn't leave South Street without pizza from Lorenzo's! |
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| If you've ever been to Philly, you've likely been to Lorenzo's. They offer pizza by the slice and toppings aren't an option. The slices are bigger than my head (literally) so Chris and I split one. |
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| Penn Station- Philly |
It's funny, I always seem to be coming or going from Penn Station. It's either Baltimore's Penn Station, New York's Penn Station or now Philly's Penn Station. Chris met me by the Christmas tree when I got into town. Isn't the tree beautiful? You can tell how high the ceilings are with the tree as reference. The tree was at least 15ft tall if not taller!
Sal and Jo were generous enough to host us this weekend. Sal welcomed us with pumpkin beer and snacks.
Chris told me that he had a Christmas surprise for me a month or two ago. Obviously, I was dying to know what it was! He told me to bring a dress, but wouldn't give me any clues as to what type of dress other than "a nice one".
Hmmm...what type of "nice" dress would you bring?
Whenever I asked him what we'd be doing, he said we were going jetskiing.
Haha, very funny.
Needless to say, I brought three dresses.
Finally, on Friday after we got into town, after much pestering on my part, he told me where he was taking me!
Luckily, I had brought an appropriate dress!
We went to dinner at a cozy Italian restaurant, La Viola, and then went to one of the most beautiful concert halls I've ever seen. It even began to snow on our way there!
The Kimmel Center hosts "The Glorious Sound of Christmas" each year, where the Philadelphia Orchestra performs with a choir. They played traditional Christmas carols, Tchaikovsky, Handel, and even did a jazzy interpretation by Duke Ellington of a piece of the Nutcracker. It was incredible. The acoustics in the performance hall were phenomenal.
Santa made a trip down from the North Pole to conduct a portion of the event and a local newscaster read the Night Before Christmas.
I adore Christmas music and they performed all of my favorites.
I loved every second of it. Christmas is such a great time of year and this event really put me in the holiday mood! We had amazing seats and the music was done so well.
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| This is the view from our seats of the audience behind us. The hall was magnificent. |
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| I was so excited when Chris told me his parents were going to meet us. We had such a great evening with them! |
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| Isn't he handsome? |
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| I didn't have a mirror to see behind me when I was doing my hair, so I made Chris take a picture so I could see if I needed to fix any of it. Worked like a charm! (He thought I had completely lost my mind!) |
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| Santa! |
We also got to meet up with some friends from our Bali adventure while we were there. I was completely surprised by my holiday weekend and had a wonderful time. Chris definitely spoiled me!
What do you like to do to get in the holiday mood? Do you have a lot of annual traditions or do you like to find new events to attend every year? I'd love to hear about how your family celebrates!
I hope you all are enjoying your holiday preparations! Back to studying for me. One Accounting final to pass tomorrow night and then I can relax for a bit.
Happy Holidays!!
