Back in Mrs. Riley’s AP English class, senior year, we made “Life Lists” which are often referred to as “bucket lists”. We were supposed to record 100 things that we wanted to do/see/experience/own before we die. Well, one of the things on my Life List was to go to Washington DC and see The Mall. This past weekend I did! (And by “I did”, I of course mean WE did!)
Josh and I both loved all the monuments, but especially the Lincoln Memorial! It was so fun to talk about all the different presidents of our country and what they contributed while seeing the monuments built to honor them!
Sup, President Obama?!
Fay’s favorite place from the whole trip was the Smithsonian Natural History Museum. She got excited about all the different animals and loudly proclaimed each of their names! Her favorite animal these days is a gorilla, and when she saw one she started walking like a gorilla and practically yelling “GORILLA!!!!”
We went to Arlington National Cemetery and got to see the changing of the guard. It was a cool experience. I feel like it is a beautiful thing to have a place to honor the men and women who have served our country, and in many cases, given their lives for it.
On Friday night, we had dinner with some friends who live in Arlington, VA. I am more than a little upset that we forgot to get a picture with them! But it was super fun to see the Chlarsons, and they took us to a REALLY yummy burger place in Arlington called “Good Stuff Eatery.” If anyone is in the area, I totally recommend checking this place out and getting the toasted marshmallow shake and TONS of fries!
Early Saturday morning (Approximately 3:15 AM), we got a special surprise in our hotel!
Those are firetrucks behind us! The fire alarm sounded and the entire hotel had to evacuate in the middle of the night! It was actually somewhat amusing to see how different people responded to it, as well as to see everybody in their jammies! The story is this: Apparently some fellow got really drunk and decided to pull the fire alarm levers on several floors of the building. So there never was a fire. Just an idiot. But we get a really great story out of it!
Later in the day on Saturday (around 10:00 AM), we went to see the DC Temple! It was beautiful! I didn’t realize just how big it is! And we didn’t get a picture of it, either, unfortunately. But we did get a picture in the Visitor Center!
And I got to see a friend from back home who is serving her mission there! Yay Sister Griffiths!
That’s right! I’m friends with beautiful people!
Small aside: We went to a Walmart nearish to the temple and it was seriously the classiest Walmart ever! There was a parking garage with parking ushers! There were elevators and escalators, and even the people there seemed uncommonly classy. I felt cool just buying bagels there!
Our drive home took 6 hours because there was crazy traffic from DC all the way to Richmond! This is a picture of Josh being very patient with it all while I was not very patient.
We had so much fun in DC! We totally want to go back!
I want to visit D.C. again, too! I’m glad you guys had fun. That’s crazy that your hotel got evacuated! But I like the picture of Fay chilling in the parking lot with her pacifier.
There is a really classy Target, like the Walmart you went to, in Annapolis. It has a parking garage and escalators and it was in a high-rise like an office building. I almost felt like the $1 rack should cost more because it was in such fancy building 🙂