Philadelphia Trip

In 2010, President Thomas S. Monson announced that a temple would be built in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Unlike some areas out West, a new temple on the East Coast is a HUGE deal and I knew then and there that I would want to take my whole family to tour the Open House once it was completed. At the time, I only had a 4-year-old and a 2-year-old. Now 6 years later we have added two more kids to our family and my desire to let them tour the inside of a temple had only grown.

We made the trip up to Philadelphia (about 2.5 hours away) on Friday, August 12th and met my sister and her family there. We did our temple tour first and loved seeing the inside and outside of this beautiful House of the Lord. It had several features unique to its being built in Philadelphia so it was fun to look for those too.

They built the temple right in downtown Philadelphia with a parking garage underneath and a stake center next door. Such a gorgeous building that will bless the lives of so many people in Pennsylvania!!

After our temple tour, we checked into our hotel which was nearby and headed to lunch at the Reading Terminal Market. Oh my gosh...if you are in Philly you have to go here!! It has amazing food from all over the world, almost like a gigantic mall food court but so much better. We ended up eating there three more times on our visit. So fun and yummy!!

Then we headed on a walking tour of Philadelphia where we passed Chinatown...

And visited the Liberty Bell and Independence Hall. The kids were fascinated by the man playing a unique instrument from the 1700's...

We hit the last tour of the day at Independence Hall and then made our way back to the hotel for some rest and relaxation before hitting the streets again to visit the temple at night.

It did not disappoint!!!

The next morning we went swimming at our hotel, got donuts from the Reading Terminal Market and then walked over to the Natural History Museum.

Afterwards we hit the Reading Terminal Market again (do you get a sense of how much we loved it there!?!?) for a late lunch/early dinner before heading back home.

Such a fun, spiritual, educational, and HOT trip to the city!!