Washington DC

We took a somewhat spur of the moment trip to Washington DC to go the the open house of the temple before it is rededicated after remodeling. We also got to see some of the most famous sights of the nation's capitol, although we missed out on a lot because we didn't plan properly. 

Of course we had to make a stop at Target since I haven't been there in years. This Target was especially fun because it had an escalator (one of Natalie's favorite things) for people and for shopping carts. The kids had to play on this for awhile before we checked out and headed over to the temple.

We stopped at the visitor's center and then took a tour of the remodeled Washington D.C. temple.

We took the trip with our family friends, the Garcia's, and while we were there we ran into our friends the Chavez's who were on their last day of their trip (and who had given us the idea to take this spur of the moment trip in the first place). So we decided to all take a picture together.

Afterward, we had time to go see the White House as well as go to the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History, but we didn't plan very well and didn't have much time or quite get to see everything we wanted. 

 

 

Also, everyone was pretty tired and we had a few breakdowns, but dinner at Chick-fil-A helped.

We didn't have tickets to the Washington monument, but were told that if you went really early in the mornin you could wait in line to get them. It was a rainy day, but Asher and I got there nice and early to wait. At first we didn't know where we were supposed to be and just wandered around, but eventually we found where we were supposed to wait and due to the rain, not many people were in line.

Once everyone else got there, we left them to wait in line and I took most of the kids (all of ours and some of our friends') to explore the WWII memorial. There is a pillar for each state, so we took a picture with Colorado.

They were able to get tickets, so we got to go up inside the Washington memorial. Here are some views from the top.

And here is Natalie just outside the Washington monument and meeting some ducks on her way to the Lincoln memorial.

All in all, for how quick and not-well-planned this trip was, everything turned out pretty well and we had a nice time. We are glad we got to visit the US capitol before we head back west.