oh beautiful, for spacious skies...

Those words from "America, the Beautiful" pretty much sum up our recent trip to Washington DC. [The lyrics from "these boots were made for walking" was a very close second!] Everyone I talk to coming from Asia always comments on the blue skies - and it feels so redundant to keep saying it, but it's true: the sky here is beautiful!

Day One of our three-day DC stopover was Monument Day. After we drove up from Virginia, we checked into the hotel, swam for an hour or so and then hit the monuments about 5pm. We were hoping to avoid the hottest part of the day but still enjoy being outside. Overall, I was glad we chose to get out later - it helped fight the heat, but we were all beat when we made it back to the hotel room after 9:30!

We took the Metro to a stop near the White House and then walked down towards the Washington Monument and the WH. [And can I just make a casual, with-only-three-days-of-experience observation? The Washington DC Metro system was the worst subway system I've ever ridden on. It felt old, dated, unreliable, and hard to use. This is the capital of the United States of America - is that really the best we can do? Really? I'm rating BEIJING ahead of DC. That's sad.]

This was the first picture of the afternoon, taken when everyone was still fresh. The girls had little activity books that I printed out from the National Park Service so they were excited to finally see the monument up close.
From that point, we walked about 1/4 mile to get up to the monument. Since Abby had been restricted to her stroller or car seat for a big chunk of the day, we tried to let her get out and stretch her legs. I'm glad she won't remember this trip, because she wasn't too happy that most of it (for her) was spent sitting down and buckled up. That's just how it goes when you're a kid. Emma was happy to lead her around for a bit, and Samantha quickly jumped in Abby's spot in the stroller.
Once we got really close, the girls were happy to pose and let us click away!



And then, I gave Emma my camera and some serious safety warnings and told her to try and take a picture of Josh and I. She did a pretty good job, don't you think?
Then, I mistakenly assumed a bystander was American, when in fact they were Russian...but at that point, I'd already opened my mouth and asked them to take a family picture for us. There was an interesting and rather uncomfortable exchange, but in the end, I got a nice picture of all of us:
From the Washington Monument, we started the 1.2 mile walk down to the Lincoln Memorial, but stopped here at the WW2 memorial to dip our feet in. I decided not to get into the history of World War II, except to tell the girls we weren't allowed to play in the water because this is a pool meant to remember the brave soldiers who helped America. They were already getting American History 101 with the other monuments - I was afraid they wouldn't even have a clue what I was talking about. The dip in the pool was refreshing; I'm not sure if Abby would say her fall in the pool was refreshing or not, but the rest of us were pretty happy.

Walking toward the Lincoln Memorial, I saw trash cans that would have made Asian garbage collectors jump with glee:
This was a long walk! [And my kids seriously used the bathroom more times on this trip than EVER in their whole lives. Not even kidding. AND - can I make another casual observation? The public restrooms in these places? Seriously? This is the best we can do?]
I so totally love Abraham Lincoln. I just recently read a collection of 5 essays about him that made me love him even more. One essay talked about how Lincoln was a slow learner and not a natural expert on anything, but was so hardworking that he could eventually become an expert on nearly any subject, just through sheer work and tenacity. I'm going to mail the magazine to my friend John who loves history more than anyone else I know. [Do you hear that, John? I'm going to mail this to you! Oh wait...you don't read my blog. Never mind.]

Anyway, I loved being up there with Abe and reflecting on the things he's left our country.
Then Emma asked to take a picture and it turned out really similar to mine. I think I'll give the camera to Emma more often!
I found myself marveling all day at the blue sky and white clouds. Having it as the backdrop to some pretty significant places made it all the more special.
Sidenote: Josh is totally the Abby-whisperer. He can calm her down and make her laugh and get her to obey like nothing else. I'm so glad he's around and so willing to take Abby duty!

Next stop from the Lincoln Memorial: the Jefferson Memorial. I tried to look up online how far it was from the Lincoln Memorial, but I think the approximate distance is a little over a mile. It felt like twenty!
The plan was to sit on the verandah and watch the sunset over the Tidal Basin, but in fact...all the girls had to go to the bathroom and the sun had already set by the time we made it back. Bummer!
Our day of Monuments and Memorials was fun but it was exhausting! I'm sure there's a better way to do it all, so if you know of a better way than we did, please share! There were some great resources online for getting kids involved in the memorials; most useful to me was the National Park Service website that had FAQ's and interesting facts about each place.

DC Day 2 - "The Smithsonian Museums" coming soon!