seeing elder murphy + quebec city

THIS was the real reason Dane and I tagged along on our trip to Montreal:

I probably wouldn't have wanted to make all the effort to get there (getting Dane a passport, flying with Dane AGAIN just three days after getting back from our other month-long trip, sightseeing all week by myself while Tommy was at the conference), except that my cute oldest little brother is there on his mission. And Dane was born three months after he left on his mission, so they'd never met each other--and we were never going to get such a perfect chance to see him again. So we bought our tickets, called his mission president to ask permission to take him out to lunch, and rented a car to drive the 1.5 hours out to Sherbrooke where he is currently serving. All so that we could get a picture like this:

 We took him and his companion out to lunch at Chez Charlie (one classy establishment, obviously) and had a really awesome time.

Let me tell you, Austin is a baby whisperer. He loves babies. So of course he really loved Dane.

And Dane finally warmed up to him, after bursting into sad, sad crocodile tears when first getting a hug from Austin.

So sad that this picture is so blurry! 

Although it was so short seeing Austin, it was totally worth it. We got to learn more about their mission and what they do every day, and it was so fun hearing it in his own words instead of just in his emails. We told him all about Dallin leaving and our trip with the fam. So good to have this uncle-nephew bonding time (although I wish I'd gotten in another picture with Austin instead of just getting ones with Dane!). We love you Austin! We miss both of the Elder Murphys who are out in the world now.

Since we'd already rented a car for the whole day, we took the afternoon and drove up to Quebec City, two hours north. It's a very historical, stone-walled city with lots of amazing, old buildings and scenery.

This building is the most famous hotel in the city, and possibly in the world (according to the guidebook--who knows what that even means). It's called the Hotel Chateau Frontenac and it's over 150 years old--and gorgeous!

How cute is this--we ate dinner at this restaurant and they sat us at this bar right looking out the window. Dane was so cute.

This picture cracks me up--Dane just sat there making this face on Tommy's shoulders for maybe 30 seconds. I don't know what he was thinking about but he sure looks bemused.

The highlight of the night--we found out that Cirque du Soleil, which originated just outside of Quebec, does free shows every night in the summer at an outdoor theater right near the water. So we made Dane stay up wayyy too late past his bedtime and waited around for an extra hour or so to watch the show. Although we didn't get to stay the whole time (because of Dane's bedtime), we got to see enough to make it feel like we saw the whole show. It was so cool.

And then we flew out back to the good old US of A the next day. And we are SO GLAD TO BE HOME! Ah! We are back to regular life and it feels soooo good.