An Afternoon in DC

Jon's class ended early last Friday, so we decided to go to the Museum of Natural History in Washington DC. We have been telling the kids for a long time that we were going to take them to see real dinosaur bones. Jon ran in ahead of me so he could catch the boys' reactions to the T-Rex.

dragging me closer

Sean said "Whoa! Look at the dinosaurs!" He liked the T-Rex the best. Matthew's favorite was the Triceratops. I'm sorry I didn't get a picture of it for him.

Matthew was giddy about some of the displays. He kept asking for a picture by everything.

I like Sean's nervous face in this one.

The boys liked looking down at all the sights.

This one we took especially for Lorainne. She calls the boys (and her other grandchildren) Crystal children. Here they are in front of a massive crystal.

There were a lot of things out with signs saying "Please touch" which was great for this kids. 

At one point in the gems and minerals area, there's a "cave" and the boys really liked walking through that part. 

There's an insect zoo just past the butterfly pavillion. Part of their display is a house with lights to show where bugs would live in your home. 

I think there were about 8 different stands around the house with information about different bugs. At the bottom was a bug that you would push and it would light up where the bugs like to hide. Kind of creepy, but also informative. :)

 This guy is a horned caterpillar. He was eating leaves of a tomato plant and will turn into a moth.

There was a "nursery" in the insect zoo too where there were lots of different types of cocoons waiting to be hatched. It was pretty amazing to see so many in one spot and to see how many varieties there are. 

The kids loved the museum, and so did Jon and I. I probably could have spent more time there and looked at the exhibits a little more slowly, but I'll take what I can get.

After the museum, we walked down to the Washington Monument. It was such a beautiful day!

The boys raced ahead of me.

 Sean, Matthew and I are the little dots on the left. We were giving the kids a little break from walking.

A couple of pictures of the obelisk.

Sean started complaining about sore feet, so we took a few breaks at the many benches along the way. We saw a silver tree across the road and it looked like a fun place to explore. It turned out to be the National Gallery of Art Sculpture Garden. 

There were some magnolia trees blooming. The white ones smelled especially amazing. But I was happy to see anything blooming!!

We (Jon mostly) did NOT like driving in DC. We didn't even drive around for very long, but it was long enough for him. We did have a nice view as we were leaving though.

We really enjoyed our quick trip, but we decided that was probably enough DC for our kids. We don't think they'll appreciate or remember very much of what they see. I hope to come back again when they're older...when they can't (or really shouldn't ) ask to be carried when their feet are tired...when I can put them in charge of carrying more snacks. Yep, that will be a good trip.

Adventures in Maryland

Most of the time while Jon was in class, the boys and I stayed at the hotel. It often looked like this:

The boys also built lots of forts or piles of pillows to jump in. They were very creative in their small space.

The first couple days were pretty cold, but then the sun came out!! The boys and I went to a park called Point Lookout State Park. It was very pretty there. If you can tell on this map where it is, you can just imagine the beauty of this park.

It was still pretty windy, even though the sun was shining, so we didn't linger as much as Sean would have liked (he was mad when we left!), but it was still fun.

Sean wanted to walk out to the end of this rock path. Matthew was scared of the waves for some reason (they were really slow moving, so I don't know what his deal was), so I stayed with him and sent Sean off on his own.

Sean was pretty excited to be out that far and was running and jumping on all the rocks. I was pretty proud of his agility out there.

Before we left for Maryland, I looked up some lighthouses because I thought it would be fun to see them. There's one at this park, but it's only open to the public on weekends, so we didn't get to go inside, but it was still fun to look at.

Here's a little panoramic video for you

There were lots of signs around telling about the history of the location. There was a hospital there for a while. I guess John Smith landed here and spent lots of time in the area. There was also a POW camp and there is a memorial set up for the prisoners who died there just outside of the park.

I was trying to take fancy shots of the scenery

Here are a couple pictures at the memorial site...

...and the cemetery. We didn't walk around here, but the obelisk was picture worthy.

We were driving around the countryside and there was a wild turkey taking a leisurely stroll across the road. 

While we were in Maryland, we also visited a Naval Air Museum. It was fun to see this museum as we love the Naval Undersea Museum across the country.

There was a control panel that the boys sat at for a long time flipping switches and turning knobs. Then we went into the room where there was a plane to sit in.

Sean wanted to know how all the controls worked. He was very interested in learning how to fly the plane.

Matthew, on the other hand, was trying desperately to figure out how to get buckled in (he's sort of a fanatic about buckles)

There were a couple different model aircraft carriers, tons of model planes and helicopters, some weapons, a few ejector seats, uniforms, engines, and more. It's a nice museum.

Outside, there were many airplanes, some helicopters, and 2 trucks on display. They were really cool. The museum was about to close, so we had to look at them all quickly.

Go Navy!!