Washington DC

We finally made it to Washington DC at the beginning of April.  I can't believe it took almost 3 years before we actually went.  We had a great time.  We stayed with our good friends, the Straits.  It was so much fun to spend time with them and so nice of them to have us all in their home.  They joined us in the city our first day.  We spent 2 days exploring the city and the evenings hanging out having fun.  I'm so glad we finally made the trip!  There's so much more to see.  I would have loved to see more of the memorials and Brent would love more museums, but there's only so much to be done in 2 days with kids.  We were hoping to get lucky and see the cherry blossoms when we were there.  Unfortunately, the predictions were off and they didn't blossom until 2 days after we left.  Apparently they were only really nice for 3 days before the wind an rain took them away.  We still had pretty decent weather so we won't complain.

Day 1

top left - waiting for the Metro - so excited, first subway ride for all the kids

others - on the Metro (Elliott and Derek took books to read the second day since they didn't have friends to entertain them; Preston is playing with my phone)

Washington Monument (under renovation due to earthquake)

Lincoln Memorial

We enjoyed our lunch on the grass below the memorial, what a beautiful picnic spot!

top left - WWII Memorial

bottom right - Vietnam Memorial

 The White House

center - Preston in front of the National Christmas Tree

bottom right - just a really cool bunch of trees near the White House

We finished the day at the American History Museum.  I guess I didn't get any pictures there.  Most of the cool stuff is off limits to pictures.  The most memorable thing we saw was the flag that inspired "The Star Spangled Banner."  It is huge!  It's interesting that people for a long time were cutting pieces off of it as keepsakes.  So there are parts missing and some patched parts, but what a neat piece of history. 

Day 2

Ford's Theater

Elliott's teacher told him he should go to Ford's Theater.  Unfortunately, we got into the city too late to be able to go inside.  They still perform shows there, so it is only open limited hours for tours.  The house on the right is the house where Lincoln died.

National Archives

This was my favorite, even though we had to wait in line for over an hour.  I thought it was so cool to see the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, and the Declaration of Independence.  The writing on the Declaration, I believe, is pretty faded, but the others are still easily legible.

Natural History Museum

The kids only had so much energy, so we didn't explore the whole museum.  Besides, I've heard that could take a couple days.  :)  We did see the bones, gems & minerals, and the Hope Diamond.

Air and Space Musuem

There are a lot of cool things at this museum - the Wright Brothers plane; The Spirit of St. Louis; Amelia Earhart's plane; Apollo 11 command module; space suit worn on the moon, with moon dust still visible, and more.

 This is as close as we got to the Capitol Building - just a couple blocks, but a couple blocks we weren't willing to walk.  The bottom picture is the Smithsonian.

Day 3

Arlington National Cemetary

On Sunday before heading home, we stopped at Arlington.  We got to see the changing of the guard at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier.  That is a really neat, solemn experience.