dc: day three

{We started another gorgeous morning on the National Mall - besides getting drenched the first day, our weather was unbelievable. The view of the capitol on one side and the washington monument on the other were fabulous. It was interesting to us that it was sandy gravel around the mall rather than a paved sidewalk}

{First stop was the Smithsonian Castle - the original Smithsonian building. It is a gorgeous building but it felt a little underutilized. There was this fun exhibit set up in the lobby from the Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian movie that Carly thought was fun.}

{on to the Air and Space Museum...my favorite part was the magnitude of the planes that they had hanging all over the building. Carly wanted to see Amelia Earhart's plane because of the movie. Disappointingly they had that area blocked off for maintenance but we were able to see her little red plane over the partition.}

{We went back down to the Tidal Basin to catch a couple of monuments that we missed the day before including FDR's. It was not what I expected and it was a little chaotic due to a big tour of teenagers. That might have taken away from what I am sure is suppose to be a serene memorial. Carly liked the water fall fountains and seeing Roosevelt's statue with his dog Fala because we had talked a lot about him before our trip.} {I did however love the Korean War Memorial which prior to reading about this trip, I had never heard anything about. I'm so glad we made another trip down and searched it out. It was well worth it.}

{Our one picture of all four of us together. Since we were back in the Lincoln Memorial area we decided to grab another look and see if they had taken down all the barricades from the day before. They hadn't. But, we did get a good photo opt.}

{Next up, Museum of Natural History. Fatigue and trying to squeeze so much into a short amount of time probably prevented us from truly enjoying all this museum has to offer. We saw the Hope Diamond, the dinosaurs, the whale and one of Carly's favorites the giant squid. We also caught Tarantula feeding time even though the spider was not interested in the volunteer (a cricket).}

{hands down my favorite was our trip out to Arlington Cemetery - the grounds are serene, the views of the city are beautiful, the history is so interesting. It says pride, dedication, honor, respect. We saw the flame at JFK's burial site and the Arlington House - Robert E.Lee's home and learned more about the story behind Arlington Cemetery. We experienced the changing of the guard at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier which words can not describe. Then we got a special treat of seeing the guards lower and fold the flag for the evening.}