Washington DC, Day One

On July 1, we left home for a week in our nation's capital.  Ella had jump rope competition there late in the week so we made a family trip out of it.  We drove in on Sunday hoping to hit Cafe Rio but much of the DC area was without power from storms that blew through including the shopping center with the restaurant.  We were VERY disappointed.

We stayed at the George Washington University Inn in Foggy Bottom.  It was a perfect location.  We were two blocks from the metro, five minutes from the river, 3 blocks from Trader Joe's and surrounded by fun local eateries.  We parked our car on Sunday when we got there and never moved it until we left.

The first morning, we walked down to the Potomac and Marc took the kids canoeing.  Only four could be in the boat at once so I stayed back with the waiters.

Took some pictures of Mary.  She is such a fun age right now.  I love this four year old.  She is kind and helpful and happy, most of the time.

She said enough pictures.

We found a little bit of shade and sand while we waited.

That afternoon we had scheduled a tour of the capital building.  

We listened to a lot of interesting things and disappointed our children by refusing to buy anything at the gift shop!

We left our hotel room right after lunch and took water and things with us so that we could spend the afternoon seeing sights and going to museums.  Before entering the capital building, security personnel go through your bags and ask you to dispose of all water bottles.  The theme for the week was definitely heat.  It was boiling hot.  After much whining, I bought popsicles and water from an overpriced vendor on the street.  I believe it is the federal government that is employing the asian people who sell $3 bottles of water on the street after they take them away from you.

Tanner wanted to send this picture to his math teacher and ask him to figure the volume.

We spent at least an hour doing this.  Feet in the water just cooing off.

Before heading back to the hotel, we walked through the American History museum and Tanner tried to give gum gum to this statue.

Rylee's birthday

On July 13th, Rylee turned 15!

She had some help opening her gifts.

And some help blowing out her candle!.

She is starting high school in a few weeks.  I am starting to feel old!

Newport, KY

Last summer one of the young women at church worked at the Newport Aquarium.  I was able to buy 1/2 price tickets through her that were good for a year.  Since they were about to expire, we went down one Saturday to check it out.  

I should have checked out what was going on downtown before we went because it was some sort of sausage festival and a Reds game.  It was busy.  We ended up parking on the Ohio side of the river and walking across the purple people bridge.  If I had checked what was going on downtown, I may also have found out that there would be a cervical cancer display called 'Panties across the Bridge".  Yes, the entire span of the bridge was covered with ladies' underwear and there were many questions about what cervical cancer is and why it was only girls underwear.....

 Some were more interesting than others,

We had a great time seeing the sharks.

The eels looked like grass.  It made me think of something you would see in SpongeBob.

None of the kids were as tall as the shark.

But they were taller than the penguins.

We stopped for dinner and when we walked back to the car, the panties were all gone.

Let's catch up, shall we?

Last Wednesday was Ella's 9th birthday.

We started with our traditional breakfast in bed.  Most of the kids really make it easy on me.  They know that I will buy a box of cereal of their choice (even sugar bombs) so they usually just want that.   Waffle Crisp, juice, milk and fruit and she was happy!

I don't do friend parties for the kids every year.  This was an off year for Ella, but she definitely had a plan.  She wanted to get pedicures with me and then go to lunch and canoeing with dad.

We had a great time getting pedicures.  She loves the massage chair.  She got a manicure too since she was done long before me.   She hasn't bitten her nails in over a week and was super excited to show me that she is growing nails.

Marc has been busy at work and had to fix someone's something in surgery that day so lunch had to wait.  They tried to go canoeing, but Marc didn't get home early enough to make the last departure at 3pm.  Then they tried to go paddle boating and thunder and lightning rolled in.  They finally ended up at a local indoor go cart place.  

We did have a couple of families over in the evening for cake and ice cream sundaes so Ella would feel special.

Happy Birthday Ella!  We love you lots!

Thank You Taryn!

For those of you who thought I had forgotten about this blog, I didn't.  After I changed the template, the sign in tab at the top disappeared and I could not figure out how to access it!  My sister-in-law Taryn sent me a message with another way to sign in and it worked!  I was almost sick at the thought of losing all those potential blog books!  Updates soon!