More Weekend Museum Adventures

  Hey this is Billy.  I'm going to do the posts from now on!  Just kidding.  Caitlin has been super busy lately so I thought I'd post about what's been going on before we forget all the details.  Just to report about the business - Caitlin is doing well teaching her 7th graders.  They tell her that she's the best student teacher they've had and one student made her a homemade Valentine's Day card which was really cute.  It was a girl in one of the classes and she drew a picture of Caitlin after having baked a cake and judges were scoring it.

  Caitlin has stories everyday about funny things the kids do, but she also has her fair share of stories each day of students that act out and cause a lot of trouble.  Poor Cait, 7th grade is such a weird time for kids.  I wasn't weird though.  I was awesome.  That's what all the kids said in their messages to me in my yearbook at the end of the year (probably because only my friends signed my yearbook).

  My internship has been going well.  I enjoy it.  I like all the other interns I work with and the staff is great too.  I've been talking with lots of constituents on the phone, responding to mail that comes to the office, giving tours of the Capitol and meeting all kinds of interesting people.  The Senate has been busy lately with a bunch of hot-button issues like gun laws, budget, hearings for Senator Hagel, immigration reform, drone use, etc.

  So school and the internship keep us pretty busy all during the week so we have to really utilize our weekends to see all the history and gems that the area has to offer.  The weekend after we went to Mt. Vernon we went to a couple museums - the Natural History Museum and the Air and Space Museum.  We first went to the Air and Space Museum and spent maybe 2 1/2 hours there.  It was awesome.  We we in love with the Space portion of the museum, but we didn't take many pictures there.  Here's some pictures from the museum starting with Caitlin next to some airplanes and rockets.

 

Caitlin laughs really hard when she takes pictures of me because I tend to do a fake smile, or smile too much, or show my double chin, so it takes sometimes up to four tries before we can get a decent picture.

Planets!

 
 The Natural History Museum was awesome!  There was so much to see there!  Here are some pictures.

Wolverine - This is the mascot to Caitlin's high school

This is a giant sloth!

This is a painting on a wall we thought was funny

I thought this was a funny angle

Megalodon!

T-Rex

More T-Rex

Two whales!  Just kidding, I haven't gained that much weight...

Giraffe

There was an insect and spider exhibit which Caitlin was not too thrilled to see

This is me resting after taking 5,000 years to see everything in the entire museum

Here's the Hope Diamond.  Caitlin likes necklaces and said she wouldn't mind having this one someday

Mt. Vernon

This week was super hard for me.  There are lots of kids that are just mean.  So I was really looking forward to the weekend!

Friday we had a night in watching GATTACA...I had to watch it to prepare for school next week.

Then Saturday we went to Mt. Vernon with my BYU student teachers program!  We met at Crystal City at 9 am and Becky, my adviser, picked us up.  Mt. Vernon was awesome!  Billy got to come with me too which was great.  We learned so much about George Washington, his life, his family, his interests, and his whole history!  It was amazing!

I had fun popping up next to all these statues of fake George Washingtons

 

 We just thought this was hilarious...looks like George Washington's horse is kicking that guy in the crotch haha!

After this little museum we ate lunch, then headed over to the house!

The whole group and the mansion...

George Washington's gardens

Awesome trees

We got to see the slave quarters, hear from an actress Mrs. Washington, and get a tour of the house.  Then we went out to the back to see the same view of the Potomac that George Washington saw every day.

Back of the house

 Sorry about my bad posture...yuck (and I have gloves in my pocket)...I just love that tree!

Then we went and saw where George Washington and Martha Washington are laid.  George Washington specified in his will that he wanted to be buried at home in Mt. Vernon rather than under the Capitol building which is cool.

George Washington! (and Martha on the left)

After seeing the tomb we went back to another museum that had a bunch of artifacts from the house.  We got to see some real clothes that George Washington wore!  And real jewelry that Martha wore.  And a bunch of other cool things from the house.  I think that was my favorite part of the day.  Then we were done and we went back to Crystal city.  Me and Billy decided to go to Costco and then out to eat :)  Super fun day!  I love George Washington!

The Capitol

Last weekend me and Billy had a lot of fun!  On Friday we met at Union station after work and school and ate dinner.  Then we rode the metro over to Costco for gelato and getting a few groceries :)

Saturday Billy took me on a tour of the Capitol!  It was awesome!  First, before we headed over there, we stopped at this yummy little place in union station and picked up some delish croissants...such a happy snack.

Then we walked up to the Capitol.  It was so nice that Billy had his intern badge!  We were able to just walk right past security people and we were able to get tickets to the pre-tour movie and get to stand right in the front of the line!  It was awesome.

Here are some pictures of the Capitol visitor center which was way neat in itself:

Statue of Lady Freedom...the same statue and size as the one that is on the top of the Capitol

After walking around the visitor center we went and watched a short video about the Capitol and American history and it was great!  It made me so proud to be an American!  Then we got to walk around the Capitol all by ourselves which was so fun!  We got to go places where the tours don't get to go.  Here's some pics:

The old Supreme Court Room:

This is the Senate Rotunda that had a beautiful chandelier:

This is called the crypt (it's right above where George Washington was supposed to be buried):

The very middle point of the Capitol and of Washington DC:

The most realistic sculpture of Lincoln (according to Lincoln's son):

This is the main rotunda:

George Washington

Andrew Jackson

Statuary Hall (old House of Representatives Room):

Where John Quincy Adam's desk used to be.  If you stand here and at the same point on the other side of the room and talk softly the other person can hear you...its pretty cool we tried it out :)

Brigham!

This is the couch that Barack and Michelle sat on before walking out for the Inauguration!

George Washington statue

The Capitol was so so neat!  I loved it so much.  Lately I've been kind of wondering why America is even so great compared to other places...and now I can't believe I ever even wondered that.  America is amazing.  We are founded by such great men on such great values!  I love America!  I feel so lucky to have been born here!

After the Capitol we went over to the Botanical Gardens for just a few minutes until it closed.  It was pretty amazing!
 

Cool tree

Capitol made out of sticks and wood and stuff!

After the gardens closed we headed over to 7th Hill pizza.  We've heard lots of good things about it.  It was pretty good.

It was a fun weekend!  We can't wait to see more of the museums downtown!  Wish we didn't have to work and could just play all day everyday :)