Spring Break DC-White House, Museums, and Monuments

Tuesday we were up early to walk by the White House on our way to the Archives.  We stepped out of the Metro and discovered a White House welcome center that was just opening for the day.  We loved the model that showed all the rooms and learned lots of cool stories about different First Families.

We had to stand in line to take our pictures in the recreated Oval Office.

We tried to walk by the White House on our way out but fencing didn't let us anywhere near it.  Stopped on the sidewall for 15 minutes or so we saw a large cavalcade of black suburbans and police vehicles escort someone important to the White House.

All the fencing had taken us far off our path so we chose to visit the American History Museum first.

Lily found Trudy Ederle's goggles.

We had just learned about the Battle of the Sexes tennis match listening to Rivals! 3 on our drive to Monticello so the girls were excited to see Billy Jean Kings outfit from that match.

And Captain's Shield!

The First Lady's exhibit was fabulous. 

Fun to learn about the Teddy Bears named for Teddy Rosevelt and sit on a bus showing transportation through the years.

Then on to the Natural History Museum where Emily was in her element and Lily and I only lost her once.

Hope Diamond.

Next we headed to the Washington Monument - our tickets for the day before were canceled due to the tornado warning so they honored our ticket and let us up - a first for all of us.

The view's were amazing.

Jefferson Monument

Lincoln Memorial 

White House with fountain dyed green for St. Patrick's Day and the carnage in creation of the new ballroom.

The reflecting pool.

The Smithsonian's and Capitol.

After our trip to the top we were ready to tour all the monuments and memorials in spite of the chilly 40 degree weather.

WWII memorial

Reflecting Pool in front of the Washington Monument

Lincoln Memorial - We enjoyed talking about the Gettysburg Address.

After the Martin Luther King Memorial Emily and I convinced Lily to walk all the way to The Jefferson Memorial.

Roosevelt Memorial led to lots of conversations about his life and the difference between him and Teddy.

We arrived at the Jefferson Memorial just moments before a group of Middle School Kids so we made our visit quick before we were overwhelmed by their noise.

At this point we had walked our feet off.  Our feet were hurting but we were still at least a mile from a Metro station and Uber was way too expensive so we trudged on.  On the ride home we found a place to eat near a Metro stop and everyone was okay with so we stopped and were all thrilled to sit down, fill our bellies with yummy food and take some dessert back to the hotel with us.  We watched a movie then headed to bed with 29,088 steps and very sore feet.

Spring Break DC- Capitol, Art and Tornados

Monday morning we had to be up early to get the metro figured out and get to the Capitol on time for our tour.

Luckily the forecasted rain wasn't too heavy until we made it into the building.

While we waited for the tour to start we looked at some of the state statues and reminisced about Aunt Laurie's long lesson about Helen Keller the last time we were here.

The very center of the Capitol under the rotunda and above the crypt - build for Washington but never interred with a body.

The rotunda with its famous paintings, freeze, and domed ceiling.

Emily was disappointed to learn that the two statues from Idaho were both white men totally unknown to her.  She is determined to start a petition to get us some new statues...but who?  That proves to be a difficult question.

We stopped by the Library of Congress to find out it is closed Mondays...on to the Supreme Court building.

We were allowed to go into the court room to get a little lecture on how the court works, who sits where, and what kinds of cases they hear.  It was very informative.

By the time that was over we were starving and started walking towards the Natural History Museum thinking we would eat there but we were too hungry so we stopped at the Art Museum for lunch.  After lunch we decided to do a quick look at some of the more famous works of art.

While viewing an announcement came over the loud speaker, "The museum will be closing due to tornado warnings.  Please exit the building by 2:00 and seek shelter in the nearest sturdy building."  We found this ironic because the art building seemed pretty sturdy and all the nearest buildings were part of the Smithsonian and thus closing as well.  I guess this explains why Aunt Laura told me to be careful the night before while texting me about the weather - everything had looked fine to me except some rain 🤷.

We stayed as long as we could then faced the weather, which actually felt quite lovely if not for the ominous sky.

We grabbed some photos of the castle and started walking toward the monuments.  Emily and I figured we might as well see a few more things before we called it a day - Lily was rather uncomfortable with this plan and was justifiably angry when the rain hit quite suddenly drenching us and sending us back tracking to the subway.  Maybe we should have listened to her, but then again a little water never hurt anyone.

Soaked, we joined crowds of others seeking shelter from the storm and trying to make their way home.  The afternoon was cut short but we made the most of it by resting our feet, stretching, filling out our March Madness brackets, eating Italian nearby with incredible service, and driving a bit to grab Crumbl for our sugar needs while we watched a movie before bed.

Spring Break in DC - President's homes and Zoo

On our way to the airport Friday afternoon I had Emily check our boarding passes for some piece of info and she noticed that the flight status said, "canceled".  I called Greg and continued driving to the airport.  After a lot of confusing texts, emails, waiting in line and chatting with an airline agent, we returned home for a several hours wait until our 11:30pm red eye to Atlanta.  But we made the most of the hours.  Emily did her online homework so we didn't need to bring a computer with us and then both girls did a much needed deep clean of their rooms.  It was a bit of a bummer but I was trilled to see their carpet again.  

The red eye left us without much sleep so we enjoyed our three hour layover in Atlanta sleeping laying down on the floor and benches.  We arrived in DC around 10 and quickly made our way to Montpelier, Madison's home.  We had sadly missed our 10:00am appointment to tour his home and only had 30 minutes to explore the grounds, but it was worth the stop.  

The grounds were beautiful, especially this Japanese Cherry tree in full bloom.

We drove on to Monticello, Jefferson's home.

We loved all the fascinating inventions and preferences that Jefferson built into his home.  Like the clock that showed time and day of the week.

Many natural history relics.

numerous skylights, and a lovely personal library.

His bed that could open into his bedroom or his office is most unique and quite short for such a tall man.  But since he slept sleeping sitting up I guess it worked out okay.

Each room had a built in area for the bed which wasn't a hit for all of his guests - many felt trapped.

He disliked large staircases for the waste of space but these little things are taking small a bit too far.  How did his house help make it up and down carrying laundry?

His daughter didn't love the bed alcoves and enjoyed this special bed in the style of the ones she was used to in France.  She used the built in alcove as a closet.

The dome was my favorite room so open, light, and spacious, and like much of the house filled with lady bugs 😂.

This area off the dome must have been a lovely hiding place for the kids to get away from all the adults in the house.

The beautiful grounds kept us busy for a while and we found more cherry blossoms.

We ended our day at the 1784 Michie Tavern just down the road where we enjoyed authentic southern food.

We forgot to take a picture of the delicious fried chicken, hush puppies, and potato wedges but we did capture this pickled egg that would have been served back when the tavern opened (we didn't love it).

Stuffed and sick from all the fried food we drove the two hours back to DC through some beautiful country.  We fell asleep rather quickly that night grateful to sleep in an actual bed.

Sunday morning we caught a sacrament meeting in Alexandra then headed to Mount Vernon, Washington's home.  We had been there back in 2018 so they tried to recreate a picture from that day.  This was a repeat visit for all of us but we still learned a lot and enjoyed the grounds.

Our favorite new kid bits of info were about the exterior of the house but unfortunately it was under renovation so you can't really see it.  

We learned that it is made of wood but carved to look like stone bricks.  Then they painted the wood and threw sand on the wet paint giving it the look and feel of stones.  For years they historians used sand from the Potomac which made the house look white, but recently they discovered that originally sand from a quarry was used and that sand looks more beige - that is the sand used today.

We also learned that as Washington added onto the original house he inherited he struggled to keep things symmetrical due to a large staircase inside the house.  There are also several strange gaps between windows that make symmetry difficult to achieve so he offset the pediment and cupola to create a feel of symmetry but if you look closely it is all very wonky.

In this picture we were trying to recreate a photo from 2018 - they are much bigger now!

This wall color is authentic - pretty cool right?  It was also a two story room with fake windows on the outside to keep symmetry but no second story windows inside at all.

Dinning room with an amazing ceiling and another cool wall color.

This is the sitting room where guests would wait to see Washington.

Many people stop by his home to meet the President and very often they were invited to stay.  His guest rooms were busy with guests.

This is his room and the bed where he died.

This shows a bit of the wood siding process.

Great view out of his back windows.

We enjoyed exploring the vast grounds before we found some lunch and headed to the zoo.

The girls loved every minute at the National Zoo.

Orangutans

Sand Cats

Panda's were one of the highlights

As was the must see Pallas Cats that were glaring at us - Lily has wanted to see one of these for years.

We stayed until the zoo closed - enjoying the last moments with all the critters before making our way back to the hotel to find dinner and give our feet a rest.