Washington DC, Part 1

Every year, Bryan goes to the National School Board Conference in Washington DC & this year I decided to tag along. We didn't want Sadie to miss school but thought it would be fun for us to make it a special trip just for Sophie. So, Sunday morning, we flew out while my mom stayed home to take care of Sadie:

Sadie was a little disappointed to not go with us, but Sophie was so excited! When we landed it was really cold & raining. Luckily it was Sunday, so not everything was open & it was Super Bowl Sunday, so we just headed straight to the hotel to hang out. We had dinner, hung out in the club lounge & then headed up to our room to watch the game:

We lucked out & they upgraded us to a free 2 room suite so we got to stay up late & watch the game after we put her to bed in the other room. 

The next morning, Bryan went to his conference while Sophie & I went off to tour the city. The high was 35 on Monday so I decided to do a trolley tour so we could hop on & off as much as we wanted:

Normally I would have walked more & we still walked quite a bit, but it was a bit chilly out there so the trolley was nice & warm every time we hopped back on :)

First stop, the White House:

I don't think Sophie really understood who lived at the White House but she said no matter who it is, they were probably cooking bacon & eggs since we were there early :)

And when we turned around, we saw the Washington Monument, which she said right away "Mom, look - it's Rapunzal's tower!" 

I absolutely loved seeing the city through a toddler's eyes! From here we walked over to the White House Visitor's Center, which I loved:

I could have spent a lot more time here because I loved seeing memorabilia from the White House through the years. Pictures, furniture, china, etc. I could have taken pictures of a lot of things but I tried not to, except for this:

I literally laughed out loud when I read this because I thought of Bryan right away. He does the same thing with gummy bears & I could totally see him doing this if he was president!

Next stop, Union Station:

I thought Sophie would like seeing the trains & stopping in a few shops. She was also impressed with this really big bell out front which is also known as the Freedom bell. While we were out there, I took a picture of the capital:

When we walked in I couldn't help but notice the gold on the ceiling. It was a really pretty train station!

Next door to Union Station is the US National Postal Museum:

For those who don't know, I am very old school when it comes to letters. I prefer to still send mail the old fashioned way & I still write letters quite often. I actually prefer to send paper invitations as opposed to electronic invitations so for these reasons I just had to see what this museum was all about. As soon as we walked in, they had stamps everywhere along with their story. I really enjoyed reading about them & seeing them through the years. And then we found a table with a ton of stamps that you could actually go through to start your own collection:

I think Sophie got bored because I spent so much time digging through them so she took a picture of me! I personally like most of the stamps with flowers on them & then Sophie was elated when she found a Christmas stamp with Santa on it:

Before we left, we played around on a computer & I let Sophie design our own stamp. She wanted a picture of us, we added a border & then we wanted it to be a Forever Stamp:

Apparently this is what it would have looked like 100 years ago:

When we walked downstairs, they had a timeline of how mail was delivered through the years:

Sophie really liked this part of the exhibit & was very educational for her. We talked about how they didn't have cars back then, so the mail was delivered by horse & carriage, then by train:

And if the mail has to go really far, especially over the ocean, it may have to be flown by airplane:

Of course she got really excited when she saw this:

She recognized the blue box because I drop off mail most of the time instead of utilizing our own mailbox & of course she recognized the mail truck because they patiently look for it every afternoon. 

When we finished here, we hopped back on the trolley & apparently Sophie was tired because she fell asleep fairly soon:

The next stop was the Capital but since she was sleeping so good, I stayed on & took a picture in front of it while I was still sitting on the trolley:

I would have loved to have gotten off & taken a tour but they dropped off pretty far away & I know the tour would have taken a while, so I thought that would be something better to do when we come back when the girls are older. 

We also drove by several monuments & memorials but I let Sophie sleep for about 45 minutes before I eventually woke her up here:

In case you didn't know, there are 19 Smithsonian Museums in the United States & 17 of them are in DC & they are all free! (Hopefully I have my statistics right, but I think that's what they said on our tour). Of course we didn't have time to do all of them, but everyone suggested I stop here because this one is best for kids & they were right. Sophie loved it! We spent most of our afternoon here. As soon as we walked in, we saw Ocean Hall:

She even saw Dory & Nemo:

lots of animals:

dinosaurs:

along with all sorts of skeletons, mummies, insects & butterflies. We even saw a brief exhibit about space, the moon & she got to touch a piece of Mars:

I was excited to venture up to the top floor to see the Hope Diamond:

Next door to that was a whole exhibit dedicated to minerals, gems & stones found from the earth & transformed into jewelry. Sophie is a girl after my own heart because she loved the jewelry! She even walked around & asked me to take a picture of a few items that she wanted to show Sadie:

She liked the tiara above & she thought she found Moana's necklace:

I'm telling you, so precious traveling with a child!

We left the museum in time to catch the last shuttle back to our hotel where we met up with Bryan. He was going to dinner that night at Carmine's & they invited us to go also:

When we were walking out they had one of those kiosks set up where you could take a picture & we had a fun time playing around with it:

Bryan & I usually like to walk when we are in the city, especially after a big meal like that but Sophie was having a hard time. First of all, it was late. Way past her bedtime. Second of all, she had been a trooper all day so by this time, she was done. Finally, she hates the cold. We realized that when we went skiing, but she emphasized it again this trip. It was a 15 minute walk & poor Bryan ended up having to carry her the entire time:

It was a long day, but we had a great time & she honestly surprised me how good she did & how much we actually got to see. Next up, part 2 for the rest of our trip!