National Zoo

Quick break

I'm gonna call this a tie.

Jenny and Taylor

Big Cat paws

The Zoo had misters all over.  It was a much needed time out from the heat.

Amber fits in an elephant collar.

Gary makes friends everywhere we go.

Waiting to go into the Giant Panda Habitat

Allie and a Panda

Don't you just want to bring one home?  Kelly and I did.

Definitely not a Panda.

White House Tour

Many months went into the planning of just the White House Tour.  We submitted our request to Senator Kohl in January and then we waited and waited and waited....... and waited some more.  We received notice  on the last day of school, June 7th, that we had been approved.  Whew!!
Getting to the White House from our hotel went fairly smoothly.  Gary rocks driving in DC!!  The one wrinkle in our plan was the parking garage didn't open as early as we needed.  We did end up finding meter parking nearby.  Not knowing how strict security would be with the appointment time, we dashed through a park to the White House only to find out the area we needed to be in was still about a block and a half away.  We were a bit late but based on the number of people in line, we were fine.
Security was very interesting.  First we waiting in a line to give a secret service agent our name and ID.  When I instinctively waited for some of the other girls, I was told to continue on and they did not continue until I did.  We then were given National Park info for adults and girls, crossed the street and waited in another line for screening.  The first screen was xray, the second was a medal detector where we also emptied our pockets.  We were then ushered out what appeared to be the backside of a trailer onto a sidewalk that led to the White House.  Upon entering the doors, we saw the Rose Garden.  We walked though a hallway of pictures - past and current administrations.  I wish I could remember all of the rooms we saw.  We were only able to look into most of them and there was a secret service agent located in each room for questions.  Before we knew it, we were outside.  The most photographed side of the White House is where we exited.  After some pictures, we made our way to a nearby gift shop.  In my haste to leave everything but ID's and phone, I completely forgot about having the girls bring money.  Thank goodness for Mom, Kelly and Dad, Gary who borrowed us some.
Next we were onto the Zoo.......

Cooper's Rock

Gary's new friend

Goofy Girls!

The bathroom they thought was the worst thing ever.  Mainly because the walls were so short.

Picnic lunch

Alexandria, VA

Part of the Kitchen

Rest of kitchen

Bedroom with 2 queen beds and a giant walk in closet.  All of the girls were able to keep their suitcases in the closet.

View from the livingroom

Wi fi access!!

Second bedroom

"We're too tired to look at anything else...... Can we go to the pool?"

They didn't even sit still during pool break times.

Visiting a mall near our hotel.  Lots of closed stores and restaurants.  But, they didn't ask to go to a mall a second time.  ;)

The girls who planned the pool surprise

Pool time was a favorite evening activity

Metro station near the hotel.  The hotel offered a shuttle any where within a 1 mile radius.

First time using the Metro tickets - success!

Here it comes!

Hotel entrance

The hotel we stayed at in Alexandria was a former apartment building converted into a all suites apartment.  Our room  had two bedrooms, two bathrooms, full kitchen, dinning room and living room with a pull out couch.  We utilized their pool and breakfast areas daily.  Breakfast foods included cereals, waffles, danish, fruit, yogurt, muffins, bagels, milk, coffee and juices.  The area had several restaurants, the mall, grocery stores and a convenience store within walking distance.  

Reynoldsburg, OH

Allie's rain gear!!

One room

Bouncing on Kelly's bed.  :)

Amber and Allie's bed

First night's hotel in Reynoldsburg, OH

Thumbs up for Air Conditioning in their room!!

 

And the 'staches have it

We arrived at our hotel at about 5:30 last night, got ourselves situated in the rooms and walked to the Cracker Barrel for dinner. We hung out for a while afterwards for a couple of games of checkers and embarrassment for the girls while we danced to the country music playing. :)
And even though we've been getting them up early and running them all over, they were still rowdy and didn't want to go to sleep last night. Eventually they did after waiting to draw on the first person to fall asleep. Nobody was drawn on when I finally said time to sleep.  Which brings us to today...... we had 6 hours left whe we started. We woke them up at 5:30 to be at breakfast at 6. We left at 6:30 and should be in EC between 1 and 1:30. Woo hoo!!!!
Right now they are playing truth or dare..... hmmm..... they've als played would you rather and see the pictures below.