Like I mentioned, I love good public transportation, and the Metro was pretty great.
We got off the metro and thought we were going the right way, but of course weren't and took the LONG way to the National Museum of American History.
But I got to get a picture of the EPA building for my dad on the way, so I'd say worth it. (My dad has no love lost for that government agency...) (Nothing like squinting into the sun...)
The thing about DC is that there are so many BIG, heavy, imposing buildings. They're everywhere!
We finally made it to the museum and scouted out what we most wanted to see with the time we had. Giant Lego flag? Check.
Dorothy's Ruby Slippers? Check.
This was a really cool four-sided grandfather clock. On this side was the planets, which I took a picture of for Cole, but it's hard to see how cool it really was.
Original Sunstone from the original Nauvoo temple. (It felt good to see this. It's been hard to be Mormon lately.)
Kermit the Frog! (Our first celebrity siting.) ((Some would say our only...))
Archie Bunker's chair and hat - I remember my dad watching that show.
An oooold Apple computer. I offended Lance by asking if he had one of these when he was a kid. (He was not offended by the age reference, but that I thought he had ever owned an Apple product.)
And they took Julia Child's entire kitchen and put it in the museum. How cool is that?! (You can even see her handwritten labels on the coffee maker down on the left.)
We also got to see Old Glory, the flag that inspired Francis Scott Key to write the national anthem. It was a lot bigger than I expected! (And a lot more tattered. Apparently people used to take pieces of it as souvenirs. Go America.)
You couldn't take pictures there (besides, it was too dark), so I stole this one from the interwebs.
I could've spent the entire day at that museum. I really love American history! But alas, we had bigger plans - a tour of the White House!
We found a Segway Tour along the way. I thought it was cheesy at first - but by the end of all our walking on the trip I wasn't quite so judgmental. (Yes I was. I still think they're silly.)
The White House tour was why we didn't have any bags or anything with us that day. They were VERY strict about what could go into the White House, which was pretty much your phone and your wallet and that's it. We had to stand in this long line and then go through not one but two ID checks and then walk by a drug/bomb sniffing dog who was hidden behind a curtain like the Wizard of Oz or something. It would've been intimidating, but the Secret Service guys were all very friendly and nice.
We got really good at asking people to take our picture for us. (And returning the favor!)
Did you notice something else? No coats or jackets! The weather was soooo nice for mid-November. A bit breezy, but just beautiful.
It was so cool to be inside and see places I had only seen on TV or the movies. (I just finished rewatching The West Wing, and it was great.)
Here's our other celebrity siting of the trip - the First Dogs! Bo and Sunny came walking through the hall with their walker, like it was no big deal. (It was no big deal. But still. First Dogs of the US! Everyone get out your phones and snap a pic!) You can see them there in the middle of the photo. (Way to get them, Deidra!)
I can't remember the order of the rooms we went through, so if they're out of order, oops.
Here's the portrait of George Washington that Dolley Madison saved from those dang British in 1814. I didn't realize it was so big. Well done, Dolley!
The Green Room.
Kanien and Cyndi in the Blue Room. They are just so cute!
Deidra and me in the Green Room. The walls were so pretty!
I promise I wasn't playing on my phone - just taking pictures. (In fact, I didn't even take my camera on this trip. My new phone takes AWESOME pictures!)
The Red Room. Very original naming. Doesn't Deidra's hair look great? Man, I need a deep waver.for my hair!
The dining room. The flowers on the table smelled so good!
My shoes weren't the cutest - but they were SUPER comfy. Which is what was needed on this trip!
We got really good at posing while other people took our picture. :)
Okay, I need posing lessons from my friends. They always look so cute and I look all stiff and awkward.
We got really good at taking pictures for other people, too.
Taking pictures of each other happened a lot, too.
And goofy selfies? Abundant. (I love this one so much.)
This is when we looked over and realized the Eisenhower Building was RIGHT NEXT DOOR and how close we had been to it the day before. We're awesome.
Another selfie gone awry.
We wandered Pennsylvania Avenue for a bit. Just us a thousand of our closest tourist friends. And loud pro-Trump people. Ick.
So then we had to wander a bit to find some lunch. By this point we were getting pretty tired - we had already walked A LOT and had to get up to the Capitol by 3:20 for a tour. Unfortunately, we misjudged how long it would take us and we got there a bit late. The intern in Congressman Rokita's was so nice and helped us get where we needed to go, only then we discovered that they weren't giving any more tours. SO SAD. The exceedingly tall intern had just told us how busy he was, but he kindly offered to take us on a tour. While he was calling his office to let them know what was going on, another intern overheard us talking about a Brigham Young statue that was supposedly somewhere in the Capitol building. She asked if we were Mormon and it turns out that she was too and she offered to let us join the tour she was just about to give. Woo-Hoo! So we joined two homeschooling moms and their gaggle of kids and went on a rather busy (with kids) and quick tour (again, kids). But it was fine because between the 4 of us we have 14 kids and we're no stranger to things like this with kiddos. (We are strangers to women openly nursing their toddlers while walking around the Capitol Building... but more on that later.)
The "crypt" in the Capitol.
The Capitol rotunda is under renovation right now, so most of the art is covered and there was scaffolding everywhere.
But the ceiling in the hall of statues was really pretty.
So that lady in the center with the white blanket over her front? She's the nursing mom and she was in our group. I mean, we are total advocates of nursing. Even in public, no big deal, really. But she had a toddler strapped to her front and wasn't really covering herself much. Let's just say we saw a lot more than we bargained for during our Capitol tour!
The Brigham statue that got us our tour!
My most favorite selfie of the trip. :)
By this point we were really dragging, but that didn't stop us from getting a few more pictures.
We tromped back home and melted onto the chairs and couch. So. Tired. But eventually we decided to get some pizza for dinner from We The Pizza (best pizza joint name). We would've had it delivered only it was like an hour and 45 minute wait. And it was only a 10-15 minute walk. So we decided to walk, except we, as per usual, went the wrong way and probably walked an extra mile and a half. Blergh. So tired!! But the pizza was good and the company was even better, so we survived.
During our wanderings I took a few pictures of the Capitol at night because I thought it looked like it was wrapped in bubble wrap.
After dinner and trudging back home I looked at my FitBit and realized we had walked 10.5 MILES that day. No wonder we were so tired! Of course, that didn't stop us from talking late into the night. :)
No comments:
Post a Comment