DC Day 3: Walking, walking, and more walking. (And Monuments)!

Our third day in DC, we planned to hit the National Mall for monuments. But first, the International Spy Museum!

We stopped at a Starbucks on the way to the spy museum, and then headed straight there. The Spy museum is a fun museum if you like James Bond movies. Nile wanted to go since Nate went two years ago. We moved through it fairly quickly, as I don't think he liked it quite as much as Nate had. We were through there in about an hour.

We stopped on the way back at Paul, the coffee shop where we had eaten breakfast the prior morning. Nile had been wanting to try one of their macarons, since Nate had talked about the "horrible pistachio macaron" he ate there. Nile opted for vanilla and thought that it was great.  While we were there, we put together a game plan for the rest of the morning.  We discussed heading to the White House, but Nile wanted to skip that and just head to the monuments. So, we started at the Washington monument after a quick walk through a sculpture garden on the way.

Holding up the Washington Monument

We made our way through the whole Mall, hitting all the major monuments. Nile liked the WWII monument best.

WWII Memorial

On the steps of the Lincoln Memorial

Selfie at the Lincoln Memorial

FDR memorial

FDR memorial

We finished up around 12:30 after walking around the Tidal Basin to the Jefferson Memorial. It was lunch time, so we found a small sandwich shop a few blocks away and walked there.

After lunch we headed back to the hotel, where Nile lasted about 10 minutes before wanting to head back out. So we walked up to the Hirshhorn art museum and spent an hour looking at modern art. The main exhibit was on 80's art, so it was colorful and interesting.

Back to the hotel to regroup. We rested about an hour, then decided to walk to the Capitol building on our way to an early dinner.

Just one more picture, please?

Dinner was at an English pub, literally tucked away in a corner. It was a small place but the food was good.

After that we were pretty tired so we headed back to the hotel and called it a day. We had an early flight and we had walked just over 11 miles. We watched some TV and hung out there for the rest of the night.

It was a great trip.

DC Day 2: Air and Space Museum

A highlight of every trip to DC is the National Air and Space Museum. That was our singular goal for Sunday. 

In the morning, since the museum doesn’t open until 10, we headed to a coffee shop for breakfast. 

My breakfast: Leek Quiche with Greens and black coffee.

Coffee.

My breakfast.

Nile’s breakfast: Apple Turnover pastry, Lemon tart, and a mocha. With three extra sugars. 😂

The Lemon Tart.  It was really good.

After that, since it was only 9:30, we headed back to the hotel briefly before walking the single block to the Air and Space Museum. We joined the line of people waiting to enter and got in a little after 10 am. 

Not thrilled to be waiting in line.

As always, we enjoyed exploring the museum. We saw two movies: “Dark Universe” narrated by Neil Degrasse Tyson, and “D-Day 3D” narrated by Tom Brokaw. Both were fantastic. 

We finished up at the museum around 1:30and headed back to the hotel for a late lunch. 

Space: the lunar module

Bullets.  In many sizes. 

Tickets

Very stylish glasses

After lunch, we called for a ride to Arlington National Cemetery. We had pre-purchased a tour of the cemetery, which ended up being a good thing. Our tour started at 3:30, and we ended up on an open-air cart. It was a bit chilly. As we didn't have a ton of time, we opted to stay on the cart and didn't get a chance to see everything. However, the tour buses came around every 15 minutes and we knew we wouldn't have time if we got off a lot.

Then the evening was capped by a trip to watch the Washington Wizards play the New York Knicks. It was fun, and we had seats behind the sideline reporter for the Knicks TV broadcast. (She's the blonde in the photo).

Our seats

The view from our seats

After the game we had one more stop, to a gelato place that Nate and I had visited two years ago. It was as good as I remembered, although Nile was not as impressed. I had chocolate chocolate chip and black tea, while he had vanilla and chocolate hazelnut.

DC Day 1 Continued: The March

Once we got to Washington, DC we found the airport pretty packed.

Had I mentioned there was a major march going on in our nation's capital?  The March For Our Lives was planned to begin at noon that day.
(https://marchforourlives.com/mission-statement/)

Roads were closed, and everywhere there were people walking toward the march, carrying signs and wearing shirts with anti-gun slogans. Large groups were pouring out of buses with matching shirts and chanting. It's estimated that at least 500,000 people were attending the rally. There was a ton of news media there:

Nile wasn't interested in participating. To be honest, I would have loved to join in, to be part of something so special. Looking at the crowd from a block away was really hard for me, and I wanted to be there. But this is Nile's vacation and it wasn't my time to go. (But ohmygosh it was so cool!)

We had lunch (Quiznos), then did some sightseeing. We walked to the American Indian museum, and looked around inside. Then we headed to the Holocaust Museum. I had purchased tickets online while we sat at the airport. Tickets had been sold out for months, but they release a limited number of tickets each morning at 6 am EST.  Sitting at the gate in Moline was the perfect time to check, and we had been able to snag tickets for the 3:00 entry. 

As always the Holocaust museum was great, even though I have been there three times I am still moved. 

Later on we went out to dinner and then crashed at the hotel. Two mornings of waking before 4 am had caught up with me. 

Washington, DC Day 1: The Snow

One of our traditions is for me to take each boy to Washington, DC when they are in fifth grade. The reason for fifth grade is to make sure they are old enough to appreciate the trip, and to be able to handle all the walking.

This year it is Nile's turn. The start of our trip was ominous. For the week prior, the weather forecast had gotten progressively worse, with a winter storm bearing down on the region and promising 8-10 inches of snow. And the predictions of snow were very much guesses as the line between "a few inches" and "a foot or more" crossed straight over the QC region. It was scheduled to start overnight Friday. And we had a 6:15 am flight Saturday.

We went to bed Friday night not knowing exactly what we would wake up to. I set my alarm for 3:45 and settled in for a restless night of sleep. Finally at 3:30 I gave up and looked outside to see a blanket of new wet snow.

Ugh.

I was worried about the drive to the airport. I was worried we would get there and wait for a few hours only to have our flights cancelled. I was worried I would drive off the road. All things that had kept me from sleeping well, and I woke to find they were still true. I had hoped to wake and find the snow had tracked north.

Tom decided to take us to the airport. The drive down Wolf Road was perilous. 25 mph, as there had not been a snow plow through. My instinct to turn around was still there. It took us more than 25 minutes to go the 9 miles.

Once we got to the interstate, things looked up. It was mostly wet and 45 mph felt like 90. Once we got to the airport it was raining. Remember that line I mentioned? Seems it really had crossed right over the metro area, with snow to the northeast and rain to the southwest. It had taken us 45 minutes to make the normally 20 minute trek to the airport.

Everything at the airport was on time, so we checked in, got some breakfast, and sat down at the gate. Soon the airline was boarding - the gate attendant told us they were trying to get us out early. We were on board by 6 am, with 10 other passengers. The flight was supposed to be full, but it seemed nobody else had shown up.

After another hour wait on the tarmac for de-icing, we finally took off around 7 am. Our trip was finally on, and my stress level dropped significantly.

Halloween 2016

Fall fun

Back to school (and routine!)

I sent off these three handsome guys to school today...

Kindergarten

Fourth grade

(Note: Nile just finished two weeks of a rapid palate expander - so his front teeth are widely spaced. It's temporary, they will all shift around to fill in the gap over the next few months. Can you believe that 14 days ago the front teeth were touching/overlapping?)

Sixth grade

Country Morning Coffee

It's amazing how interesting wooden blocks can be when you are in a new place. 

Science Unit Picture

This was from earlier in the school year. 

Halloween 2015

Happy Halloween from a Pokemon trainer, Batman, and a soldier. 

In case you needed a little help...

Spike!

Nile wanted to spike his hair today. 

I love that he did this himself and that he gave me permission to post it. 

First day of school

Okay, so it was almost two weeks ago. I'm late on blogging. 

At least they were all smiling this year. 

2 down...

One to go!  

I think he looks adorable. :)

Rapt

If my face were a TV, could I get this type of undivided attention?

Spring Break

This year we have headed to Millwaukee for spring break. 

Yesterday we started by heading straight to the Sprecher brewery. Free beer samples and all you can drink soda. 

Nate and Nile voted the Sprecher root beer the "best ever."  Apparently the New York Times agrees. 

After that we headed back to the hotel and swam, and hung out there for the rest of the evening. Dinner in the hotel bar...

Today we started the morning back in the pool. Then we headed to a home brewing shop, where we ran into some friends. Then it was on to Miller Park for lunch. 

I was seriously questioning if we would make it at this point. Novak was a mess. But he pulled it together and we survived the trip to the science center and aquarium. 

Measuring the years

Every year around New Year's, I pull out the old growth chart that mom used to track my and Becky's height each year. 

From this I can see that in 2014 the two older boys grew 2" each, while Novak grew 2.5".

I can also see that Nate is taller at 9.5 than I was at 12...

Best Day Ever (bucket list update)

This morning the boys were content to sit around in their PJ's and play video games. Little did they know what was in store for them. :)

While they played, they completely missed the fact that we had packed bags for each of them and loaded the car. So when we told them to get dressed and get ready to go, they assumed that we were just running into town for errands and lunch.  Nate even noticed the bags in the back of the car and asked why they were there, but was satisfied with my noncommittal answer. 

We left the house at 10:45. Still on the road at 11:45, Tom and I were shocked that none of the boys had asked what was going on. We pulled into Solon, Iowa for lunch at 12:15. We ate at the Big Grove Brewery. Thank goodness for our patient waitress!

At this point the boys still thought we were running errands. I asked them if this qualified as a road trip (for our bucket list) and Nate informed me that, "it's not a road trip until you drive two hours and stay somewhere overnight."  

After lunch we headed to Iowa City so Tom could do a little beer shopping. Nile then told me that if we drove another 20 minutes it would count as a road trip. 

Novak fell asleep while Tom was in the store. 

A short 20 minute drive later, we pulled into the Wasserbahn water park and hotel in Williamsburg. It wasn't until we parked that the two older boys finally figured out what was going on.  And they were super excited. Novak was still sound asleep. :)

Most of my pictures are of Novak because he has been glued to me like, well, glue. 

Playing card games ("War") in the hotel room. 

Watching Netflix (SpiderMan)

Check off:

Road Trip (bucket list item #3)

Stay in hotel (bucket list item #2)