On the Road for Spring Break

We hit the road this morning at 10am! We were amazed at how early we left. Our first stop was DC ... The outside plan was the Earth Day Festival on The Mall; the indoor was the Smithsonian Natural History Museum. As weather.com predicted severe weather and a flood warning, we figured an indoor plan was a good idea.

On the way down, we were hopeful - at one point it was sunny and 78 degrees But as we got closer and closer to DC, the sky got darker and darker and it soon opened up on us. So onto the museum.
Courtney scored an extremely tight space right at the front of the museum - expertly squeezing the mini van in (directed brilliantly by me standing out in the rain). Off we inside.

It was pretty busy and allready 3pm, so we quickly toured the elephant sculpture and the dinosaour exhibit, then went to see the Hope Diamond. The girls were a little disappointed in the diamond - they weren't looking for a necklace but a big huge honkin' diamond. Oh well, still pretty impresive!

A few bathroom trips later and we wereoff outside. The rain stopped enough for a quick trip on The Mall - we thought we'd catch the tail end of the festival. But they had all packed up because everything was soaked. This is where the vacation really began. Courtney and i stopped being grumpy parents and went from yelling "jump over the puddles, don't get wet" to "go jump IN the puddles." who cared if they got soaking wet? We had a car full of clothes. (of course the first puddle we told Nazeriah to jump in, she does, then starts crying her shoes are all wet - up until then the silly bug was trying everything she could to accidentally get wet!). Very soon both girls were jumping in each puddle they came up to. At the car we had to strip them down they were so wet!

Onto the next treat ... Before we left, we all got to pick out a sugary cereal - any one we wanted. Normally these boxes wouldn't see the light of day at our house, but today we had a snack of: coco puffs (nazeriah), lucky charms (kaija) and cap'n cruch w/ crunch berries (mom,dad and chayton). Yum, yum!

Now on our way to Richmond. Next stop dinner. Which was at the oh so fashionable and healthy Cracker Barrel in Virginia, where we sat next to Elvis (his jeweled jumpsuit must have been at the cleaners - he was weaing jeans.) Courtney and I got to have our first sweet ice tea of the trip. Chayton was having a good ol' time "drinking" his cup of water (read dumping it all over himself) and eating everyone's food - he loved the corn (will go nicely with the bright pink and purple and green crunch berries).

Now we are back on the road for a short drive to Richmond and our hotela for the night.

Melissa
… Sent via Black Jack - pardon the spelling …