2 Girls. 1 World. A Whole Lot to See

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    Roni started this blog in '05 to journal her weight loss. 70lbs later, she's committed to living a conscious, healthy life and hopes to inspire others along the way.

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TRAVEL JOURNAL

Our DC Daycation

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View from Lincoln Memorial

I’m tired of living so close to awesome things and not taking advantage. I live a mere 60 miles outside of DC and I never go!

Why?

‘Cause I’m too busy? I don’t want to deal with traffic? I have no money?

Blah blah blah.

I’ve decided it’s time to start DOING things. So I packed up the kids Tuesday morning and we headed out for a DC Daycation.

What do you need to pack for a daycation?

Well, snacks of course!

Go ahead, laugh at us, but by the time we came home it was all gone except for the apricots. And honestly, I forgot they were in the bag.

I decided to drive to the Metro Station in Greenbelt, MD. It’s super easy to get to and just about a 45 minute drive from the house (without traffic of course.)

The kids (well, kid, the other one is fairly oblivious) were ecstatic to take a train. We rarely travel by train because the mass transit in the Baltimore area kind of sucks. At least in our neck of the woods.

Here’s the boys waiting.

The 7 year old paced back and forth on the platform saying, “I’m waiting for the train. I’m waiting for the train.” in a funny voice.

Of Course the 1 year old thought it was the funniest thing on the planet.

The train ride was fun.

It’s only about a 20 minutes to the heart of the city.

On our way to the Smithsonian we stopped at the National Gallery of Art Sculpture Garden.

This was more fun than I expected! I showed Ryan how to read the plates that held the artist names, date and materials used and he was really interested in them all.

We talked about how we thought they made them and how he’d like to climb on some. Mostly though, his goofy personality came though and we just had fun walking and talking.

Of course we have to visit the pond in the middle and make a few wishes too.

I shouldn’t tell you but he wished for a Nintendo DS and also wished on behalf of Evan.
Evan’s wish? To talk. –he cracks me up!
Mine? Well, if I tell you it won’t come true. You know that. ;)

We headed to the National Museum of Natural History.

I didn’t look up to see what exhibits they had. It didn’t really matter so I’d rather be surprised. Well, surprised we were when we saw this!

Titanboa! oh, and I told you. Goofball.

Of course there were bones.

And bugs.

And gems.

We walked around all morning but it started to get crowded and Evan started to get ornery. I thought the cafeteria would be less insane a couple of hours after lunch, I was wrong. So we headed outside and hit up a vendor.

Why are street hot dogs so darn good?! I wasn’t going to have one until I took a bite of his. YUMMY!

At this point the museum started to get really crowded so we decided to take a walk and come back to finish the exhibits later in the day.

The 3 of us were ready for some outside time anyway.

Our goal was the Lincoln Memorial.

Goofball and I had fun along the way.

It was quite a walk but we forged a head despite the “my feet hurt” complaints.

Besides being a goofball my son is following in his Father’s and Grandfather’s footsteps. Every puddle he passed he’d joke,
“Look! The Reflection Pool. Can we go now?”

It makes me laugh just thinking about it now. I love seeing his humor come of age.

We talked a little about World War 2 at the Memorial and actually saw some veterans there.

On our walk Evan realized he could see me through the window in the carriage if he laid down.

This was not helping his on-the-go nap situation. The kid was SO TIRED yet wouldn’t fall asleep.

We made it!

He REALLY likes to mimic statues. lol

My favorite shot of the day.

On the walk back we split a frozen lemonade again from a vender.

I love the city. :)

Then FINALLY!

He fell asleep.

We headed back to the Smithsonian, checked out the rest of the exhibits and squished a penny of course!

I decided not to rush out of the city. There’s no reason to hurry up and sit in traffic. So we leisurely walked around looking for a place to eat dinner. That’s when it started raining on us!

We saw some familiar places to eat (an Austin Grill, McDonald’s) but I wanted to try something different. Recently, my husband has been on a California Roll kick and his son is following suite. We settled on Sushi!

Sushi Go Round & Tapas on 7th Street in Chinatown.

I have to admit it felt weird going in with two young kids but the staff was friendly and I knew they’d both eat edamame at the very least.

I’m doing my best to raise adventurous eaters and Ryan was game for trying the seaweed salad after some coaxing.

He didn’t like it but the baby had a few bites!

Ryan did end up eating an entire order of California Rolls and tried a piece of the funky roll I ordered, but said it was too spicy.

Evan tried a cucumber roll and the seaweed salad but stuck mostly to the tofu in my miso soup and the edamame.

After dinner we headed back to the metro station, hopped on the train, and then drove home. It was a long day. We were gone from 9:30AM until 9PM and I enjoyed every minute! Sure there were a few hairy moments with a fussy toddler and I had to tell the 7 year old to settle down about 25 times, but it was all worth it. At one point, in the middle of the day, Ryan turned to me and said,

This is way more fun than I thought it would be!
Why didn’t you think it would be fun?” I replied.
I didn’t know there was going to be so many cool things!” He said.

I smiled and thought to myself, there really are a lot of cool things. It’s time to make the effort and experience them.


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Discussion

There are 10 comments so far. Join in on the conversation.

    Patty

    August 23, 2012

    What a fantastic day! Love Ryan's poses...he's such a great kid. I remember how friendly he was at FitBloggin last year. How great that he's already into sushi. Glad you had a fantastic day with your boys. You've inspired me to use Metro North more this Fall! Reply

    Renita Domek

    August 23, 2012

    Roni, it looks like you had a fabulous day. Your boys are precious. I miss that age so much. I love how Ryan like his "reflection ponds". My kids woudl never reflect, they'd just jump right in. And for the record, I'm pretty sure you're superwoman - preparing for FitBloggin AND working in family time? You make it all look so easy. Good for you because the time flies as well you know! Loving your blog. So happy we connected at BlogHer! Reply

    KristaS.

    August 23, 2012

    Your boys remind me so much of mine when they were little!! Ryan and my oldest have that same goofy sense of humor and I totally remember my youngest looking up through the "sunroof" in his stroller, too! Gosh the memories you guys are making are just awesome. Seeing DC in your photos makes me want to go there someday. Reply

    Aimee

    August 24, 2012

    Awesome! I have a 5 year old and just love doing things like this with him. I feel like I barely lived before he came along. I work nights so I get to enjoy him all day and we truly make the most of our days. I can't wait to bring him to DC someday. I only wish my son was as adventurous an eater as your boys. I'll keep trying though. I love this blog just as much as your others. I've enjoyed Jen's posts as well. Reply

    Kathy

    August 27, 2012

    Just hopping around the blogs for some healthy recipes and came upon this after seeing a pic of DC. I was visiting there the very same day! I looked closely to see if any of my family were in your Lincoln Memorial picture. lol We visited from Western PA -my first time there. Definitely plan on returning! I will have to remember the Sushi restaurant. Thanks! Now I will check your other blog for some weight control encouragement. Reply