Trip to see Mr. Bush.....

My wonderful nephew Dakota started middle school this year. :O) As his "graduation" present from elementary school Nana and Grandpa, they decided to take him to Washington DC. Since I have never had the opportunity to go, I was invited to go along so we loaded up the car and headed out early Saturday morning......
One thing my nephew is into at the moment is collecting baseball hats from minor league teams so on the way up we stopped in Durham at the Bulls Stadium.


Even the bike racks were made like a bull!


Well, there was nothing but a bunch of bull around there that day.....their team store wasn't opened yet since it was a game day so we couldn't get a hat. (They open later on game days since they have to stay open through the game.)



No worries....we stopped on the way back and Dakota was able to get a hat plus a cool poster with all of the minor league teams hats on it! Good way to collect them.

On to DC.....once we arrived and checked into our hotel in Old Towne, we ventured into the city. Mom and Dad drove us around just showing us everything and then we parked near the Washington Monument/Lincoln Memorial and walked up to and around everything.

First few pics at the WA Monument.




Neat shot at the Vietnam Memorial.


Dakota and my parents in front of the WA Monument.


Dakota and I at the Lincoln Memorial.


Sunday we got up early and headed back into DC. The first stop was to get Dakota and I tickets to go to the top of the WA Monument. We were able to get them for 8:30pm that night! Once tickets were in hand, we were off to see The White House with hopes of seeing Mr. President.

Shall we just go knock on the door?!?




You may wonder what you are looking at here. Well, you see, my nephew needed to use the restroom between seeing the front of the White House and the back of the White House so we went into the White House Visitors Center. This picture below is of the ceiling in there. I thought that it was pretty and wanted a pic. Normally, I wouldn't put this pic on the blog ya see but it is the ONLY one I have from some of the most exciting few minutes of our trip......
As soon as stepped foot on the sidewalk outside the door to head to see the back of the White House, we saw a few police cars go by followed by a van with a guy sticking out of the top with a camera, filming backwards, followed by SEVERAL black suburbans, tahoes, etc., which were then followed by another van/camera man, more police cars, as well as an ambulance. It was the President's motorcade!!! They went straight by the security and into the gates at the White House. It was pretty neat to see and we waved at all of the vehicles to made sure we waved at George. :O) So that's the significance of the first picture below.

Once we walked over towards the White House again, we saw where they were taking down some metal barricades that were up. We asked if we could walk up to the side of the White House and were told sure. The main gate was still open with a guard standing there so my nephew asks the guard, "Sir, is the President just coming back from church?" to which the guard responds, "No, he is just getting back from a bike ride with friends." It WAS Sunday morning around 11am so D just thought that's where he should have been. :O)




Back side of the White House.



Mom & Dakota at the Spy Cafe


Excitement about the Spy Museum. (He was a good sport to pose for me.....he didn't really want to.)


Note to others: Do Not Waste Your Money! We were disappointed.


The National Cathedral....probably one of my favorite things that we saw. So beautiful!


Picture of the White House from the top of the WA Monument.


The Capitol from the top of the WA Monument.


Dakota and I at the top of the Washington Monument...sweet memory together.


Dakota and I in the Capitol Rotunda.


One that I took when outside on our tour.


These next few were from the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum.






One morning we went to Mount Vernon. It is so beautiful! The way the house overlooks the river is just beautiful. I could have sat out there all day.


Mom and Dakota at the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History. My mom is terrified of birds so we needed to get her picture beside the carcass of one.


My new necklace.


Arlington Cemetary. Wow.


Tomb of The Unknown Soldier. Impressive.