D.C.

 (LOTS of pictures :) )

 We took the 3 oldest children on a trip to Washington D.C. March 16th -21. (Sanders played with Nana and Evan ---and his parents and little brother Graham. Thank you! Thank you!) Kevin has been traveling to D.C. for four years now and the kids have come to view it as this magical fairyland...it MUST be because sometimes Dad stay there for 3 weeks at a time!

 Beckham had not flown on a plane since he was 9months. Karaia was 2 the last time and this was Tennyson's first time. He kept saying, "This is my FIRST time on a plane!" It was darling

The fun part about this trip is Grandpa Jim let us use some extra air line tickets and Grandma Candace let us share her snug, but beautiful, hotel room. It made the trip possible. Thank you SO much Grandma and Grandpa!!!!

In front of the White House

 Beckham kept "causally" calling out, "Barack Obama," in every day conversation. I think he thought if he said it enough the President would appear.

Yes, there are a million of the same pose because my children seem to like to see just how many different combinations of NOT looking at the camera they can get. :)

There was a protest in front of the White House too. It became a good education opportunity for the kids.

In the back of the White House. We were there on St. Patrick's day, hence the green shirts, and they had dyed the fountain water green!

Washington Monument. It was closed because just a few months (?) earlier there had been an earthquake making it unsafe to tour the inside.

 The next pictures are of the natural history museum. This is always such a fun place. The kids loved it.

 Beckham HAD to take a picture of the Hope Diamond.

 We walked next door to the American History museum. Most of us agreed that we preferred this museum. The one thing we didn't get to see were the Ruby Slippers from the Wizard of Oz. They were renovating that section.

 We took lots of pictures by the trains to show Sanders.
We missed him, but knew he was having a lot more fun staying at home.

 Karaia's favorite thing to do was mimic the statues we found. She got really good at it.

My favorite one!

Beckham had to get in on the fun too ;)

Notice the statue in the background

I love this one of Beckham

This was one of the highlights of  the whole trip for my kids. Our own personal room for dinner! They couldn't wait for the waiter to be done serving us so we could close the curtains. Hilarious! Grandma Candace treated us to our favorite meal of the year, corned beef and cabbage....in "our personal room!" I'm pretty sure Tennyson talked about that room  the rest of the trip!! Thank you Grandma!

 This ice cream was bigger than Tennyson. Cinnamon ice cream YUM!

 Later that night we walked around the monuments all lit up. It's pretty magical.

Beckham wanted me to take a picture that looked like he was climbing the Washington Monument....night pictures aren't really my thing...

 We figured out that NOT including all the walking we did in the museums we walked just over 6 miles this first day!!! Karaia and Beckham walked it all and the only complaint we heard was when we were about a half mile away from the hotel when we realized that Beckham had  just about worn through the heals of his shoe!

 The next day we headed to Arlington Cemetery. It was beautiful. I am always struck by the uniformity of the head stones and the beautiful contrast of the white and green.

 We had a chance to watch The Changing of the Guard.

 This tree was gorgeous! The pictures don't come close to capturing it.

Beckham's face cracks me up in this one!

Next it was on to the Air and Space museum.

 Grandpa Jim is in Iraq at the moment making sure these Predator plans can communicate with the pilots. The kids LOVED see what Grandpa works on!

Totally caught Beckham right in the middle of a sneeze! Ha! See how happy Tennyson is? He loves his Grandpa Jim!

This is the picture Tennyson took of, "Grandpa's plane"

The next day, we headed out to Jefferson Memorial. We were a week away from the Cherry Blossom festival, but you would never know! This was one of the highlights of the trip for me.

There is nothing better than a canopy of blossoms to walk under!

Gorgeous!

Some of the branches almost touched the water.

The Tidal Basin is HUGE. Look at how many trees in bloom there are!

Jefferson in the background

Karaia's poses were so funny this trip :) Tennyson could not understand WHY I was asking him to look at the sun for a picture.

"Hey, Beckham...we don't bite!"

Much better!

We tried "climbing" Washington Monument during the day...at least you can see BOTH Beckham and the monument at the same time!

Standing next to a million dollars at the treasury

We thought this squirrel was so funny hanging upside down eating the acorn. 

In front of the Capital

 Our last full day we decided to go to the National Zoo. Neither Kevin or had been before. It was fun to experience something new as a family.

We loved this exhibit where the animals intermingled with the humans. So fun!

Eating at the Hard Rock Cafe!

 If was nice to meet up with Grandma Candace at the end of the day. She had been working all week and the kids always wondered when she would get to play with them again. Thank you for dinner!!

If you didn't know this was our last day of a fully packed trip...just look at Tennyson's face. I think we nearly killed him. He loved it, but it was a lot for such a little kid.

Tennyson loved everything we did, but we could always tell when he a)needed a snack b) needed a change of view because he would close his eyes and moan, "I want to go back to the hotel!" but as soon as we took care of either a or b he was good to go for another round.

Heading for the airport on the train

Happy but tired!

We had a WONDERFUL trip! It was everything we had hoped for.

I for one am SO glad I finally got it documented!!! WAHOO!