The Johnstons go to Washington

We had the most fantastic trip to Washington last week. We stayed with Brian's aunt, Kath, and took in all that Washington has to offer. Everyone says that you should wait until kids are older to visit Washington, but we found tons of stuff for two little boys to enjoy. And outside of a few weird conversations about the "Silver War" and Vietnam, the boys seemed to just soak it all up.

We started out the trip with visits to the Air and Space Museum and the Museum of Natural History both on the National Mall. After 5 full hours of museum-going, we took our first ride on the Metro and headed back to Aunt Kath's for some take out pizza and rest.

On our second day, we took in all the monuments - from the Lincoln Memorial to the White House. Then we stopped to check out the view from the Old Post Office Tower - amazing! We took a brief monument building stop in the National Building Museum and headed back home for an afternoon in Kath's beautiful garden and sprinkler time. When the boys were finished playing, we took Kath up on her babysitting offer and walked to the cool area near her house for date night.

Then came our most anticipated day - for two reasons. First, we went to the Air and Space Annex at Dulles and it was incredible. We all agreed it was the most amazing museum in Washington with a real space shuttle and the Concorde! After a stressful afternoon of keeping the secret of the evening's event we finally made it to anticipated event number two - Kath's surprise birthday party. Kath was indeed surprised and we all had a blast.

Finally, with the cat out of the bag, all the out-of-town guests were able to come over and hang out at Kath's house for lunch on Sunday. We headed to Old Town in Alexandria for some shopping and cupcakes and then joined everyone before heading to the airport.

We were sad to leave but glad that we had such an amazing trip to kick off the summer. Thanks to Kath for a great visit and tons of fun memories!