St. Patrick's Day in Washington, D.C.

Don't be too shocked, but yes, I am going to try to start posting on the blog again.

Dave's sister's family was going to Washington, D.C. on St. Patrick's Day (2012) where her husband was going to run the Rock-N-Roll marathon. It was also my birthday that week, and since Dave's aunt lives there too, so we decided to drive up. Thursday night we drove up to the Washington area, and Little Miss Stay Awake didn't sleep in the car, surprise surprise. Friday we hopped on the subway in Centerville and rode to downtown D.C. Jessica loved it.

We found Melanie & her kids all dressed in green for the holiday. But we didn't see Uncle Sam finish his race: there were just too many people. The subway (unlike these pictures) was so packed with runners and families they stopped letting people into the station until the trains took more people out.

And actually, Nathan (front center of the next picture) got separated from us. He got off on the correct stop, but Melanie & I couldn't get off before the doors shut. Melanie said "Hey, that's my son! I need to get off" and Nathan looked panicked when he saw the train pull away with us still on it. People started hollering, and the emergency brake was almost pulled. Luckily, Dave had squeezed out another door, and they hung out until we got back to the correct stop. It wasn't nearly as traumatic as the time their daughter got caught alone on a busy elevator, which they retold.

Our first stop was the Library of Congress, my favorite building from my first trip to D.C. at age 16, touring with my family. It's a shrine to knowledge and books and betterment.

The quotes carved in stone are things like:

"THE HISTORY OF THE WORLD IS THE BIOGRAPHY OF GREAT MEN" 

-Carlyle, Essays

"THEY ARE NEVER ALONE THAT ARE ACCOMPANIED WITH NOBLE THOUGHTS" 

-Sir Philip Sidney, Arcadi

"THE NOBLEST MOTIVE IS THE PUBLIC GOOD"

-Virgil

They had a curved-wall replica of Jefferson's library, as he organized used to do by Memory (history), Reason (philosophy), and Imagination (arts). He originally designed the curved wall for a garden, which would use 25% fewer bricks than a straight wall to support itself. I feel a connection with Jefferson now, since his summer home, Poplar Forest, is in Lynchburg.

 We at lunch at the Smithsonian "castle".

Jessica was able to skip her nap by tuning us all out and drawing for an hour in her stroller.

Unfortunately the Mint was closed, so we walked over to the tidal basin. Some of us walked all the way around to the Jefferson Memorial.

This is the 100th year since Japan gave our capitol the flowering cherry trees. They were blooming early due to the warm winter, and hundreds of people were there to see them. I heard this week that the U.S. this year is giving Japan 3,000 dogwood trees in return.

There is something very solemn and strong about a building that's open to the elements, with words carved in stone. The ceiling is so high, and the steps up so broad, it's like a temple to democracy.

Posing with Dave's sister Melanie, husband Sam, and their kids Samuel, Nathan, Jane, and Andy, and Dave's Aunt Denene, who lives in metro D.C. and who served us a delicious dinner that night.

Jessica loves new places, (read: she doesn't want to sleep if there's something more fun to do.) Dave picked a Residence Marriott hotel, which was exactly like the place we stayed when we adopted Jessica.

The next day we found an LDS congregation and attended sacrament meeting, then went to see more sites in Washington. Sunday was a harder day: we couldn't find parking, Jessica wasn't cooperative and cried more than she napped, we got frustrated with the heavy traffic and confusing highways, we couldn't agree on how to do everything, we we wore ourselves out with walking. But the buildings were still impressive.

Jessica can identify Lincoln after visiting his memorial.

The Vietnam memorial. This is Dave's first visit to D.C., and he liked it. He said he didn't want to visit the Smithsonian Air and Space museum until he had a whole day to dedicate to it.

We stood next to our respective states at the World War II memorial; Jessica loved the fountains, and I loved the relief carvings of war contributions.

The Washington Monument was closed due to damage from the Virginia earthquake last year.

We parked at the utterly confusing Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, with this view of the hall of nations.

With all the construction, traffic, and sore feet, we choose to just drive by and see the back of the new Martin Luther King memorial.

Three and a half hours later we were home after lots of snacking and creative distraction for Jessica in the form of singing, story-telling, toys, drawing, movies on laptops, and watching us play Angry Birds on the cell phone.