Arlington National Cemetery

catching my breath.

It always seems that when family comes in town I get behind on blogging about all the fun stuff we do. (I never even posted about David and Lenessa's Thanksgiving adventures). So here is a little catch up.

we had a great time with Jeff's brother and his family. I think they saw more of the city than many people do who live here their whole lives. We don't let visitors off easy with only seeing one or two things.
Saturday's list consisted of :

• Top of the Washington monument (if you ever do this order tickets early!)
• Natural History Museum. Caroline had fallen asleep and woke up all wet. So she was cruising the museum in a diaper. I was still at the swim meet so Jeff broke one of his rules of shopping in a gift shop and bought a shirt. Then went outside and found a street vendor who was selling shorts. Since Saturday Caroline has worn the outfit everyday and loves it. While my favorite Olive Juice dress stays in the drawer. Who knew I could have just been wardrobe shopping off the D.C. streets.
  

• we had lunch at the National Museum of the Native American. It is our favorite place to eat and it is sad that I know the guy Mark who works there from all our visits.
• we did the Air and Space museum and buying mini metal planes for the girls kept them occupied in the crowded museum. (the most visited Smithsonian on the mall) . I bought one Kitty Hawk and one Space Shuttle. When the lady was ringing me up I asked her how much the space shuttle was, she then asked me which one was the Space Shuttle? kind of funny
• The American History Museum is closed until 2008, so they have the highlights in Air and Space. Dorthy's red shoes, Kermit the frog, a piece of the Nauvoo Temple, this cool quilt and some other highlights (Chanel I thought of you, I hope you got to see this when you came) It is a bible quilt
• This is probably my favorite photo of the day. Scott and Melissa literally running in and out of the National Art Museum. It was not worth taking the 7 kids in for a quick look. And can I just say she had a baby 5 weeks before this. She is amazing!
• we then went home while they explored some more monuments

We had a wonderful time and the cousins just had so much fun together.

On a Caroline note. This girl has completely taught herself how to swim these past few weeks. She is so determined! She has no fear and now is practicing to do the back stroke. There is a lot of sinking involved but she still gives it her best.


in our garden:
my pink hydrangeas are getting ready to be cut. My first cut batch to dry for the year.
we planted two zucchini plants and have had lots to put on the grill.we planted 3 tomato plants and hope we will be in town when they all finally turn red.


we were at Target today and to my surprise found Annie Kate's school list in the school supply section so we got all of her 3rd grade supplies. I love shopping for the supplies and am sad now they encourage you to buy the prepaid packs. This was such a fun thing I remember doing with my mom each year. I loved buying the Red Chief tablets.
last but not least, some of my recent good mail consisted of 4 passports for all the girls in our family. We leave in 3 days for Europe with our all 5 of us! We will be exploring Germany, Austria and Switzerland. We have checked out lots of books, netflixed some movies and even watched the Sound of Music to get the girls excited. So why am I sitting her blogging when I need to be packing.... avoiding responsibility I guess.

Pink Christmas details. sign up before Saturday because after that it will be a few weeks before I can answer emails.