Washington, DC!

 We finally made our trip that we've been talking about for years! For this 2-week break, we got to spend time in Washington, DC (where Rob served his mission), Pennsylvania (to visit Danielle and Derek's family), and New York City (for a fun getaway without Collin). We had a blast! We have tons of pictures that we'll have to split into a few blogs. We'll start from the beginning!

Our flight to Pittsburgh wasn't too bad. When we got on the plane, the stewardess asked if we wanted to bring Collin to meet the pilot. We talked to him for a minute and got a cute picture!

We arrived late at night and Derek kindly picked us up and brought us to their home in Indiana, PA. We spent Sunday there then left for Virginia Monday morning. We went straight to the Arlington National Cemetery and met Diana and Vance, who drove up from North Carolina to come to DC with us! Collin and Vance had never met before.

Tomb of the Unknown Soldier- my favorite part. We caught the end of the changing of the guard.

JFK and Jackie's graves, with the Eternal Flame.

After that, we headed to Vienna, VA, one of Rob's mission areas, and had Nielsen's Frozen Custard. This was one of his favorite places to eat on his mission and it was delicious.

 We drove through another one of his areas, Herndon, and saw where he used to live. This is the bridge outside his old apartment.

After touring mission areas a little bit, we headed to Diana's friends the Brands' house in Maryland where we spent the nights while there. They were so hospitable and helpful, and it was so nice to not have to pay for a hotel!
On Tuesday, we went into DC. We drove to a parking place at a metro station and went from there each day. We started by checking out all the monuments on "The Mall." It was really rainy that morning, but luckily cleared up after lunch.

Cute Collin on the Metro

Washington Monument

Representing Oregon at the WWII Memorial. The rain was fitting.

The White House!

These boys were troopers in their strollers all day! You can kind of see the Washington Monument in the background.

The Capitol Building

Me and Abe. He is my favorite.

We also went to the International Spy Museum that day. It was so cool! It was Rob's favorite museum that he had been telling me about for a long time.

Later that evening, we went to my Aunt Patsy and Uncle Tim's house to have dinner with them. They took us to a fun children's park in their neighborhood and got some delicious Peruvian chicken for dinner.

Collin enjoyed swinging at the park!

On Wednesday, we went to lots of museums. We started at Ford's Theater where Lincoln was shot. Because of difficulty parking at the metro station, we were too late to get into the actual theater, but we looked around the museum and it was pretty cool and slightly morbid. . . they had the gun that killed Lincoln as well as a bloody pillow that he bled on after he was shot.

Some of you might know why I like this picture.

We had lunch at the Hard Rock Cafe which was right next door.

Then went to the Holocaust Museum. This one was the most interesting to me. I was glad we could spend some time there, even though it wasn't the most happy place.
We then quickly made our rounds through the Museum of Natural History, the Museum of American History, and the Air and Space Museum. We also went to the National Archives building where we saw the Constitution, Declaration of Independence, and Bill of Rights!

Natural History

Natural History- the Evolution room was really cool!

Natural History

The Hope Diamond- Natural History

Air and Space Museum

Julia Child's kitchen- American History Museum

We went back to the Brand's house when we were done and they made us a delicious dinner. So nice.
Thursday morning Rob and I woke up super early to go to the temple. The DC temple is special to Rob and he has been telling me for years that he will take me there some day. We were so glad we could go together, and thanks to Diana for watching Collin for us! Even though we left really early, we underestimated the distance/ traffic by about 2 minutes and didn't make the session. We did sealings instead, which turned out to be perfect. We got to take our time walking through the different rooms. One thing that I liked was a big painting of the Founding Fathers appearing to President Woodruff, fitting for a temple in this location. The temple is so beautiful. My favorite Celestial Room so far.

We were heading back to Pennsylvania that day, but we decided to stop at the Zoo on the way, since we had heard it was a really good one. We went through it pretty quickly and some of the cooler animals weren't out at the time, but it was still a fun little stop. Even if we hadn't seen anything else though, Rob got to see the Anaconda, so it was a success.

We stopped by a frog statue to take a picture of Collin and found this on top.

We thought it was garbage so I was about to throw it away. But then inside. . . 

5 bucks! It said it was an "experiment in random acts of kindness."

Look at these precious snuggling monkeys!

Rob loves driving in the city traffic, can you tell?

That's the end of the DC trip! Hopefully the rest of the trip will follow soon.