One of the perks of Will's work is he gets to travel to cool places. Well in February he had the opportunity to go to DC again and so we decided to go as a family. First we went to New York for the weekend to visit Julia and do all the fun tourist things.
We stayed at Julia's apartment and it was fun to get to meet her roommates and super nice of them to let us stay with them. I loved the architecture of their apartment with vaulted ceilings, narrow halls, and colorful paint.
Our first stop was Times Square and we went to the Toys R Us store. We went on a 4 story Ferris wheel inside the store and go to sit in the Toy Story car.
Auntie Julia and Kirsten!
After our Times Square visit we went to a restaurant called Juniors. The food was good but the cheesecake was to die for!
We also went to FAO Shwarz where the big piano is that Tom Hanks played in BIG. Kirsten loved it but was too little to make the keys work so Will ran around stepping on the keys with her so they would work. What a good dad.
What, a Barbie Foos table?! yea, only in New York (and only $2,500!)
On Sunday we went to church with Julia and it was fun because we got to see the temple since the chapel is in the same building. After Sacrament meeting we walked to Central Park. The park is so huge there is no way we could see everything but we did get to cross this beautiful bridge.
This is how Raleigh experienced New York.
On Monday we started off our day with the Empire State Building and Star Bucks. Then I got to do some shopping with Julia at H&M, wohoo! Our favorite part of the day was going to the David Letterman show, unfortunately I forgot to take pictures but it was super fun. This is us at the top of the Empire State Building. It is a spectacular skyline even in the fog.
Our last day there we went to the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island. The most exciting part of the trip were a group of Vietnamese who couldn't stop goggling over Kirsten, they took pictures and videos of her the WHOLE ferry ride.
Our Afternoon was spent riding on a bus to DC. The ride was actually quite fun and it was cool to ride through 4 states in 4 hours (definitely not on the West Coast anymore!).
Since Will had to work when we were in DC I had the girls all to myself during the day. Our first stop on Wednesday was the Smithsonian Zoo. It was so amazing and I definitely recommend it to anyone with kids visiting DC. There were giant pandas, red pandas, a sloth bear, elephants, lion, tigers, zebras, horses, monkeys, a reptile house and so many more I don't want to list them all. Kirsten's favorites were the elephants, horses and monkeys.
This Orangutan was posing for pictures right next to the glass and the other ones in the cage were playing peekaboo.
Kirsten also decided she had so walk on ALL the curbs along the path. If they were narrow like in this picture then only one foot got to go on it. It definitely made for a long walk.
Raleigh slept through most of it but I'm sure she had a good time too.
She was so tired out from the zoo that she fell asleep with dada hours before her usual bedtime.
Raleigh was still up though!
The hotel had a pool but unfortunately it was quite cold so we came upstairs and had a nice hot bath in our swimsuits!
Thursday I went to the Washington Monument with the girls and this thing is massive, Pictures don't do it justice.
For the weekend we stayed with Lisa and Frank and had a blast. They were so good to us. Lisa made us a super yummy lasagna for dinner and blueberry pancakes for breakfast. She is an amazing cook. She also made some delicious white chocolate chip coconut macadamia nut cookies with Kirsten when Will and I went to the White House and Capitol. I think I will visit more often!
Lisa and Frank live in Virginia and fairly close to where Will used to live so they let us borrow their car and we went on a drive down memory lane. It took us to this beautiful home where Will lived up until he was eight years old. The neighborhood is really nice and definitely a family friendly place to live.
Will remembered this trail in the neighborhood so we went down it. There used to be a park not far down the trail but it isn't there anymore.
Here is a picture of me, since I finally remembered to take one of myself.
Kirsten still had fun playing with the sticks and wanted to get in the stream but we just threw rocks in it instead.
This is Will's elementary school. His class met in the room on the far left corner of the building (which you can't see because of the trees).
