Washington, D.C.

Last weekend, we took a trip down to Washington, D.C. for Independence Day--about a seven hour drive for us from Syracuse. We met up with my brother Ryan (coming from Florida) and stayed with my cousin Brent and his family. We've never been to the Capital, and it was a great trip! We drove down Friday night and left Monday afternoon.

On Saturday we went to the National Mall--a national park in the middle of the city that houses the Capitol building, some other government offices, many historic monuments, and a lot of museums. This shot is the Capitol building from the rear.

Library of Congress

National Museum of Natural History

Washington Monument and Reflecting Pool

White House

Lincoln Memorial

The kids loved the U.S. Botanic Garden--I did too, it was so neat to see all the different plants. In the children's area there were tools for kids to dig around and fountains to water the flowers with.

That evening, after seeing the sights, we settled on the Capitol lawn to listen to a dress rehearsal of the Independence Day concert. Among those that showed up to perform (some weren't there) were David Archuleta and Lang Lang (the pianist). It was a lot of fun to spend time with Ryan and also Brent and his family.

On Sunday night we went to a patch of grass near the Pentagon to watch the Independence Day fireworks over the Capitol. Monday we drove around to see a few monuments we'd missed on Saturday and celebrated Lucy's (Brent's daughter) birthday, and then left for home that afternoon. A great trip!