On Veteran's Day weekend, we went to D.C. and Frederick, MD to see Tammy and Jeff. We got to D.C. after midnight on Thursday. Kids maybe got in bed around 1 or 1:30 and Aaron and I maybe by 2. It was exhausting. Our flight started in the Springs, then we had a stop in Dallas and flew from there to D.C. Our hotel had a shuttle bus that went right to the National Mall. Tammy met us at our hotel about 10 on Friday morning, we took the shuttle and proceeded to the Mall.
It was cold and VERY windy on Friday so we ended up going to many of the Smithsonian museums located on the mall. Our first stop was the Smithsonian Castle which is the original Smithsonian building. The founder of the Smithsonian is interred in the foyer. The castle has a display that gives a sample of what you can see at each museum. It also has a program that you can plan what you want to see and then it will email you a map and a plan for all of your stops.
Maddy found this statue of a nude so interesting she took a picture of it.
From the castle, we walked straight across the mall to the Natural History Museum. You could see Washington monument one direction and Capitol Hill looking the other direction. D.C. was still replete with beautiful fall colors.
This photo looks back across the mall toward the castle.
At every building you had to go through security. If you didn't have a bag, it was just walking through a metal detector. If you had a bag, they looked through it. I got pretty sick of going through security. When you have to go through security to look at a museum, democracy is dead.
Maddy got really fascinated by this bird and took a bunch of pictures of it while we were waiting in the security line.
Maddy posing in front of a famous scene.
Our first stop in the Natural History Museum was the Gem display. Maddy found her birthstone, aquamarine. I never saw Kelsay's,which I think is garnet, but we saw lots of Aaron's birthstone, diamonds! The diamonds included the infamous Hope Diamond. While we were reading about it this guy came up to us and started asking us something about it because he heard us commenting about how it started out as 112 and something carats but is now 43 something or so carats. So the guy's comment is " So she just wanted something heavy on her chest." Aaron was cracking up so much about that. The crazies will always find us. I think Maddy thought the Hope Diamond was the gem of her dreams.
We also visited the mammals exhibit. This was an absolutely amazing exhibit. I highly recommend if you ever get the chance.
The girls used their own money to buy a stuffed animal from the museum store. We had lunch at the cafe in the museum. And then went next door to the American History museum where we had another long, cold wait to get in.
We visited the Star Spangled Banner exhibit. We were not allowed to take photos inside this exhibit. The giant 32 foot by 34 foot flag was displayed behind a massive glass window. Made by Mary Pickersgill, it flew over Ft. McHenry in 1814 as the Americans withstood the bombardment of the British navy and inspired the National Anthem. After the battle was over, General Armistead, the victor of Ft. McHenry , too the flag home and cut pieces off of it to give his friends as a souvenir when they came to visit. As a result, the flag is missing a start and has many pieces chopped out of one edge.
We then went to the first lady dresses exhibit. I don't think Aaron was thrilled with this one, but all of us girls enjoyed.
Looking at Jackie's inaugural ball gown.
Don't remember who this one belonged to but I think it was Maddy's favorite.
Melania Trump's inaugural ball gown.
Clothes worn by Dolly Madison, one of the heroes of the war of 1812.
Inaugural ball gowns of Barbara Bush, Hillary Clinton and Laura Bush. Michelle Obama's gown was also in this display and by far the prettiest but I somehow did not get it in the picture.
After the dresses we made a quick stop to see a very elaborate doll house.
Then we went back out on the mall to do what Kelsay had wanted to do all day long. Ride the carousel.
After the carousel we made a flying dash through the Hirshorn sculpture garden and caught the shuttle back to our hotel to meet Jeff for dinner.
We went to an Irish pub on the wharf and enjoyed some amazing food and great booze (ha ha).
We all slept hard Friday night, woke up and enjoyed a delicious complimentary full breakfast buffet at the hotel and then took the shuttle back to the Mall. This time, we headed toward Capitol Hill. That was a loooonnngggg walk. It was worth it though. We also saw Grant's memorial.
We thought about going to the visitor center a the Capitol, but you had to go through security and it was worse than the museums as you could not take any backpacks or water in and we were carrying both. There was already a fairly long line so we decided to skip that. We took a quick look at the supreme court across the street and then headed back on a very looonnnnggg walk back to Washington Monument.
The monument is closed due to repairs so we did not get to go to the top or anything. We continued on to the memorial side of the mall to the WWII memorial. It was veteran's day so there were lots of people there. Lot's of different vets having reunions. They had a few WWII vets at the WWII memorial. It was a very amazing experience to be at this memorial on Vets Day. I thought a lot about Papa and Grandpa and got to tell the girls a little bit about where they fought and what they did during the war.
We even found an engraving that showed a mortar like the one Grandpa fired.
This is one of the most well done memorials that I have ever seen. I think it captured the solemnity and sacrifice of that war and how important it was that these everyday people did something great to stop evil.
We walked on toward the Lincoln Memorial and stopped to take some pictures looking back over the reflecting ponds.
We finally made it up to the bazillion steps to see Lincoln. Actually, this was really a well designed memorial too. As we climbed, you felt a kind of sanctity of entering a temple which is what the designer wanted you to feel. Even though there were bazillions of people here as well, it was a great time to reflect on another critical time for the U.S. and the burden that Lincoln had in preserving unity of the country through a civil war. It was amazing read the words of the Gettysburg Address and his Second Inaugural speech inscribed on the walls of the memorial. No one is perfect but seeing those words and remembering that Lincoln had the characteristics of humbleness, self-sacrifice, and wisdom was a very refreshing experience.
After the Lincoln memorial we were all kind of shot. We saw the Korean War memorial and the WWI memorial in passing on our way back. I wish we could have crossed the street and seen the Jefferson Memorial and the Martin Luther King, Jr. memorial but everyone was so tired and hungry we just headed back toward the center of the mall and food trucks. It was after 3 by this time so we were all very hungry. After eating, we walked back to the shuttle, went and got our cars and headed to Frederick, M.D. to check out where Tammy and Jeff call home.
On Sunday morning, we had a leisurely breakfast and then went to church with them. After church, we went back to their place and ate lunch and then headed to Gettysburg.
I don't know much about Gettysburg, and didn't know what to expect having researched 0 info on the park. We only had a couple of hours so we did not go to museum they had at the visitor center. Instead, we drove out to Little Round Top, one of the main battle sites at Gettysburg. By reading signs and talking to a guide dressed as a union soldier, we were able to get a basic understanding of how the three day battle unfolded. What surprised me most about the park was the number of memorials. You literally cannot walk five feet without coming across a memorial to a regiment or a general or officer involved in the battle.
This tower was built as a monument to the 44th N.Y. which was instrumental in the Union victory. You can actually climb up inside the tower of the memorial and look over the battlefield.
After we looked around ,we drove back to Tam and Jeff's and had super. We ended the night by watching the the first half of the Broncos game, giving up and going to bed. The next morning we packed up, said goodbye to Tam and left about 10.
This gave us time for a stop on Maddy's bucket list that we hadn't been able to squeeze in yet. We went to the postal museum which is located in the D.C. post office across from Capitol Hill and saw Owney the postal dog. Owney was a stray dog that got adopted by a postman. He started jumping on mail trains and rode all over the U.S. The postal workers would put tags on his collar to show where he'd been. When he died, the postal workers collected money and had his body preserved so you can see the real Owney.
After checking out Owney, we headed to the airport. We flew to Chicago and then into the Springs. When we landed in the Springs, we met Tricia and Lynn who had been to visit my parents while we were gone. We got to talk to them about an hour and then headed home. It was an extremely fun, educational, amazing, exhausting trip. Looking around D.C. was amazing and I highly recommend the experience to all. Seeing where Tam and Jeff live and being able to picture where they are at makes them feel a bit closer. Great trip!
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