Christmas in Virginia

For Christmas this year, though John had 12 days off work, we were allowed to take just a 5 day "leave" from being near base. For those 5 days, we decided to visit my sweet Opa who lives in Falls Church, VA, about 2 1/2 hours away.

On break before the actual leave, we did several things. We went to the Petersburg battlefield, John ran a 5k in an amazing time (21:30!), and we went to the Children's Museum in Richmond.

 Thomas absolutely loved the Children's Museum. It had all kinds of displays and interactive exhibits, toys, etc.

Exploring a tunnel!

This was a neat machine that sucked colored scarves through pipes and spit them back out.

An ambulance was one of Thomas' favorite things to play in.

Riding a triceratops!

Just a random silly picture!

 While in D.C., we first visited the Arlington Cemetery. It's HUGE. We walked around to see the many memorials.

 That evening (Christmas Eve with Opa!), we caved and let Thomas have one of his presents (too big/awkward to wrap anyway). A big bag of Mega Blocks!

Loving his new blocks!

Daddy had just as much fun with the blocks as Thomas did! He made Thomas a helmet.

 Thomas immediately latched onto Opa! He LOVED his silly faces, noises, and how he patiently played with him.

Opa and Thomas playing and having fun!

New Christmas jammies!

 Thomas' Christmas Haul: Mega Blocks, jammies, alphabet game, firetruck, Thomas trainset (from John's sister Amy who had us for Christmas), playdough, puzzle, books, recorded video stories from Oma and Opa Whatcott, and a few other things.

My guys playing the piano--Adorable!

 On Christmas, we had some delicious roast and hudtspot (delicious Dutch dish with potatoes, carrots, and onions all mashed together) and we drove to the Washington D.C. LDS temple to see the beautiful lights and nativity set up for the holidays.

Obsessed with touching all the lights!

Having fun with (Great-) Opa!

Such a sweet photo.

The day after Christmas, we decided to brave the super-cold rainy weather to head into town. We rode the metro (Thomas LOVED riding the train!) into downtown and walked the rest of the way, getting cold and soaked, to the Capitol Building. We toured around a little on our own, but didn't think we were up to any of the long tours with a 2-year-old. We decided to head to the Library of Congress to check it out.

Inside the Library of Congress.

Thomas fell asleep on our way home!

Out.

What a cutie.

The next day, we went to the Air and Space Museum with Opa. There are some pretty neat aircraft there! (Including the Discovery space shuttle!)

Our last day in D.C., we were able to go into town and get a (free!) parking space right next to the National Mall and walk around to all the memorials. It turned out to be a nice day and we had a great walk around to the WWII Memorial, Washington Monument, Lincoln, Martin Luther King, Jefferson, Korea, and Vietnam memorials (plus more I'm probably forgetting).

Pointing to and naming each letter.

So cute!!

We had a great week with my Opa in Washington D.C.!! Our trip home took us 5 hours because of the horrible traffic, and we were reminded how much we appreciate the wide open roads of the west! The following Monday, New Year's Eve, we had our good friends Adam, Chuchie, and their daughter Alexis who live in Virginia Beach over for some celebrating. We played 7 Wonders (a game), checked out Ft. Clifton, ate good food, and had a good time.

So that was our holiday! It was nice to have such a great break and spend time together enjoying some of the neat things not too far from us.

This last weekend, we went to see Jamestown and Yorktown (we already saw Colonial Williamsburg). It is about an hour's drive away. (We forgot the camera, so I don't have any pictures to share.) Jamestown is the first permanent English settlement in the Americas. I'm surprised how much has been found and preserved in the museum there! Swords, suits of armor, books, and even glassware! They had recreated the ships the first group sailed over on and you can get on and explore the ship which was super neat. They also recreated an Indian village and the first settlement founded in 1607. So interesting!

Yorktown is where General Cornwallis surrendered to George Washington in the Revolutionary War. We saw another neat museum there with tons of artifacts as well as the monument there. We got a magnet for our fridge with all three of the historic cities represented. Hooray!

So now, we're down to less than a month until we head home to Nevada! We're all getting extremely anxious to leave...we miss our home, our stuff, John's job, the west, our friends, and being closer to our family.