The Nation's Capitol

Since we are just over an hour outside of Washington D.C. this summer, we wanted to make sure we paid a visit or two to D.C. to see all the neat historical monuments and sights and Smithsonian museums. So we set out on a Saturday to have our first D.C. experience. It was a lot of walking (Danny routed it online after we got home, it was 5.5 miles,) and long and hot, but it was very interesting and we enjoyed it even though it completely wiped us out! (Read: lots of pictures in this post.)
We took the Metro in (the subway,) partly for the lack of parking in D.C. and partly for the experience of riding the subway. It let us off near our first stop, the National Air and Space Museum. It was great, and the kids enjoyed learning about space explorations and airplanes.
Cole got to have the riding tour of everything. If he wasn't in the wagon, Danny carried him in the backpack. He was quite the trooper for the whole day!
We walked in and through this nose section of a DC-7 passenger plane, we had fun.

I read online about a walking tour of the monuments in D.C. called " D.C. By Foot." It was supposed to be fairly entertaining and you learn a bit about each monument and the history behind it. So we spent most of our afternoon surrounded by history. The first stop was the obelisk monument to George Washington, our first president. He was a modest man and tried to turn down the presidency several times, but the people really wanted him to run things.The flags at the top of the Washington monument looked very photo worthy. I love the US flag.

Nicholas did fall asleep in the backpack for a while, but spent most of the day a bit sleepy. He didn't complain much, though. Danny's back was worn out after two hours!

Our little group of tourists. I must get a group shot when we do outings! Here is what our tour group looked like, the guide was on the left. You will notice the umbrellas...no, it was not raining. The sun came out and was really beating down on us and the kids were not going to last long. So I grabbed the umbrella and put it up for them as shade. Some others in our group just caught onto the idea, too!From the hilltop at the Washington Memorial, you could see just about everything else. You could see right into the Truman balcony of the White House, down the hill to the World War II memorial and beyond the reflection pool to the Lincoln Memorial, as well as the Jefferson Memorial across the river and the Capitol Building at the other end. It was pretty cool to be here in the place where history has been made.

The World War II Memorial was touching. It was quiet and peaceful as you could listen to the waters of the fountains. There was a column for each state in the nation.
At the focal point of the memorial are these moving words: "Here we mark the price of freedom." And a gold star is posted for all who gave their lives in service to their country during WWII. Also thought provoking was the Vietnam War Memorial, where I was very intrigued to learn about the design of the memorial from our guide. The names of soldiers either killed in the line of duty, MIA, or POW are printed starting with when the war began (1959) and meeting again with names when the war ended (1975.) The black granite was chosen so that you could see yourself staring back at you as you contemplate the names.

We ended our tour at the base of the Lincoln Memorial and had the nice view of the Washington Memorial in the reflection pool to see where we started. While our guide finished his thoughts about the Civil War and President Abe Lincoln, Lexie and Gavin found a more interesting way to pass their time. (They were pretty good sports to last as long as they did in the heat. At least they had a nice ride in the wagon.)

We ascended the many steps to the Lincoln Memorial with 80 thousand other people (it was quite hot, can you see the little red faces on the kids?!)

And we got to meet Mr. Lincoln. I would love to come back some time when there were not so many people around, and when my family wasn't totally worn out! At least I really enjoyed the tour and time we spent.

Our last stop for the day was to the Museum of Natural History. We had to see the dinosaurs and other prehistoric creatures for Gavin, of course! (It took me about 15 minutes to get this picture because so many people were walking by.)

And my little animal lover Lexie wanted to see the mammals most. We could have spent even longer here, but maybe another day!

As we plodded our weary feet toward the Metro, Nicholas finally fell asleep. Lexie and Gavin took turns holding him while he slept, how cute is that?! That's pretty much how all of us felt. We had a fun, big day, now time for bed!