Whew! What a whirlwind of a week with the patrols in DC! But first, the report from the home front. Marly took drivers ed and was able to take the exam early and passed! She was nervous about it, but did so well. Ellie worked at Camp Sunshine (Angels for Allison) and helped drive all the places. Abby went to swim in the morning then lived her best life home alone, eating snacks and sinking into screen time each afternoon. Phil worked at the bank, of course. Voss and I had a packed schedule for Monday: group pic at the Capitol, Vietnam Memorial, Air & Space Museum (his favorite!!) all the way at Dulles then Arlington Cemetery (with his pal, Evie laying on the wreath for the tomb of the unknown soldier). With dinner at Catholic University. The next day we went to the WWII memorial then walked over to the Korean War memorial then the Natural Science Smithsonian, lunch in the food court then back to the Natural History Smithsonian. That night we went to the Marines sunset review at the Iwo Jima memorial, one of my favorites. Voss would toggle back and forth between running with the guys (there were 6 total on the trip) and taking a break with me. There were 50 of us total on the bus. Only 3 kids didn’t have a parent with them. We had a great group! Wednesday morning it was rainy, perfect morning to tour the inside of the capitol. Our tour guide was hilarious! Had me chuckling the whole time. The sun did come out for our tour of the FDR and MLK memorials, walking along the tidal basin in between. Then the Lincoln Memorial and quick pop in of the White House. We couldn’t get close with the fencing for blocks around…setting up the WWE wrestling. Really proud of our tour guide who was able to guide the entire week without even mentioning Trump. Even with his name on so many buildings, he just omitted it…or talked about the office of the president in general terms. Very classy. We had a few hours in the African American Museum on the way out of town. I think the group enjoyed the break and drive down to Williamsburg. Oh and that Golden Corral before checking into the next hotel. This one was much nicer! The final day of the trip we did a full day in Busch Gardens. We were first in line and RAN to the largest roller coaster in the back of the park being led by Ms. Greer. We rode the Griffin 3 times in a row before it filled up! We spent the rest of the day RUNNING from ride to ride making it to every rollercoaster in the park (some of them multiple times). It was epic. I was wiped out! Still had a nightcap, did a load of laundry and packed up before crashing. The bus left at 6am, Voss and I said goodbye then snoozed for a bit before ubering to Yorktown. We got lucky with a whole 250th celebration and boat parade of historic British sailboats. We got more National Park stamps then headed back to the hotel to meet up with Phil and the girls. We had lunch then drove over to Deltaville, VA and crashed my old roomie, Julia’s camping trip. We swam in the Chesapeake, had fresh oysters and local beer catching up with the Taylors. Phil bailed on the camping and Marly booked us a hotel room close by. The next morning (after a sibling knockdown drag out) we drove to PA. Phil booked us a room in Hershey. We went to chocolate world and let the kids each pick out a treat. I was kina grossed out by the whole concept, it reminded me of Buckees. Later, we had a nice family dinner going around the table talking about each other’s best attributes. We caught lightning bugs and saw a groundhog. The next morning we got up and drove to Boston. I was worried people wouldn’t like this hotel room because the bathrooms were down the hall but this turned out to be a great amenity for a large family. We each got a tote bag for the bathroom with slippers and a robe. I never waited for the potty or shower. It was very nice, and central. The girls and I walked through the gardens and found a rooftop bar for dinner. The guys went to a pub to watch the World Cup. We walked for ice cream. Here are the pics of the week.
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