Weeks 2 through 4 in DC

The rest of our time in DC seemed to fly by.  We crammed everything we could into our time there.  However, it really did feel like a home away from home with all of our usual routines in place.  Matt and I continued to try to make date night a weekly tradition.  The girls and I (minus poor Hannah who was sick that day) were able to meet with Tom Udall our NM State Senator while we were there.  We visited the senate and House sessions at least twice and we tried to see as many of the free concerts in the evening as we could.  Since we were on the East coast we thought we would also try to get a few side trips in on Matt's weekends off.  Our first was to Philadelphia.  I have to say, we were pretty disappointed with it. We had all been so excited to go but once we were there is was just not what we thought it would be.  I suppose we were spoiled with living in DC.  We decided to leave the next day to drive through Lancaster County Pennsylvania which more than made up for our disappointment over Philadelphia.  We spent the entire day meandering through Pennsylvania Dutch country and it was GORGEOUS.  Our next side trip was to New York....which was AWESOME.  We all thoroughly enjoyed our brief time there.  We could have spent a lot more time there.  Central Park was a favorite.  We spent a good 3 hours walking through it and wanted to stay even longer.  We toured the United Nations as well and that was great. We ate lots of yummy food and walked walked walked.  We were all sad to leave NY and vowed to come back as soon as we could.   Once we got back from NY we only had 1 week left in DC.  We did some final touristy things like touring the Washington Monument and seeing all the monuments lit up at night.  We also were excited to get to the Folklife Festival on the Mall.  It was an amazing experience and the Smithsonian did an outstanding job.  We met so many awesome people from both Kenya and China.  The talks were my favorite part. That last week we also tagged along as Rachel interviewed a woman who had survived the Holocaust.  She volunteers at the Holocaust museum.  Rachel was writing a series of articles as young editor this summer and this was one of them.  It was an honor for her to get to meet and interview her. The last thing we did before packing up to head home was to tour the Pentagon and spend the day in Alexandria....what a cute town.  Afterwards we got busy packing up from our month long adventure.  We left early to make the long drive home.  It was bittersweet to leave....we had such an awesome time in DC.  I will never forget all of the memories we made.  It was ice to think about being in our own home though.  The trip home was not nearly as exciting as the trip to get to DC.  Gone was the anticipation of the month and in its place was the lingering sadness over leaving and heading back to real life.  We did enjoy seeing so many places.  Not as many memory making events though when you are just trying to get home.