family visit in washington, dc

After we drove away from the Blue House in NY, we had a six hour drive to DC.  

It was a pretty drive and we stopped at Cracker Barrel on the way which the kids loved.

On Sunday morning we went to The National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception for Mass.  

We had mass in the church crypt because the upper church is being renovated, but both were beautiful.  You could explore all the small chapels inside that place for days and still not see it all.

That evening we grilled at Ben and Michelle's house and played in their beautiful big backyard.

The kids helped Nano install Uncle Ben's horseshoe set...

The rest of the week we had lots of family time together at Nano and Nana's house...

The kids enjoyed some sprinkler fun in the yard...

We had a few park visits...

Zach took the boys to the National Air and Space Museum Annex which has a bunch of huge hangers filled with airplanes and a huge space shuttle.  The boys thought it was amazing!

I managed to squeeze in an outing with my college friend Kathleen and her kiddos...

I hope these kids can all be great friends someday in college...

Then we got to have a lovely dinner with more college friends at the Lively house...

And let's just zoom in on these two for a second...

The kids all had so much fun playing together and got nice and messy eating chocolate popsicles...

I am so grateful when I get to see these girls from time to time, but it also just makes me miss them more and wish we all lived closer together. 

We did venture to downtown DC one time to give the kids the full experience of the city. 

First, we went to the Natural History Museum...

The kids loved the hands-on insect exhibit...

And, of course, there were all sorts of bones to see...

The dinosaur exhibit is a little more minimal than usual because they are working on building a new one, but we got to see a T-Rex so the kids were not disappointed...

We almost passed up a nature photography exhibit and I am glad we didn't because this picture might be my favorite from the whole trip...

Nora thought it was pretty hilarious so she kept doing it and still does...

Then we headed to the Washington Monument so the kids could check out the National Mall.  

It was a good choice since we only had time to do one more place and the humidity was starting to get to us all.  They could see all the other main monuments in every direction.  Jimmy was for sure the most impressed and wanted a picture taken with the Lincoln Memorial and the Capitol Building, even if cousins tried to prevent it...

We had a nice last night with the whole family grilling, playing in the yard, and catching fireflies (quite the novelty for my Phoenix kids)...

We got in a cousins picture and one with the grandparents...

They turned out so cute, but Aunt Nat pointed out that these pics will be out of date all too soon since another grandkid will be added to the mix in no time at all.   We can't wait to meet that little person and can't wait for all these wonderful family members to meet him or her also.  We had a wonderful and vacation, and thank God for the family members that made it all happen! We are so blessed!