The Capital; Part One

...and when I mean The Capitol, I mean our nations capitol! This past labor day weekend, my good friend and I went to Washington D. C for a girls weekend. We are both nerds cool kids so the idea of running around the Smithsonian made us giddy like little school girls. There are a few reasons why this trip was so exciting for us. First off, we have been planning this trip since our first official friend "date" this past February, before the deployment, so knowing it was finally time for our trip made us see how fast this deployment really was passing bye. Secondly, this is our last "big" thing before our boys come home from deployment. All this deployment each of us have been taking many trips and adventure so knowing this was our last one made us super excited! I must warn you, I am uploading a ton of photos so bare with me!

We stayed that the Hyatt Regency in Crystal City. I highly recommend it. We found it through price line for an amazing $89 a night! We checked later and realized that the room normally went for about $150 a night. Talk about a bargain! What was also important for us was how safe the area was we will be sleeping at night. We soon realized we probably picked the best area as far as safety went. We were able to park around the block, because lets face it $27 a night for valet parking was not in our budget. We felt completely comfortable walking around the area surrounding our hotel at night, which helped ease both of our anxiety.



On a side note, wearing fashionable boots in a city made for walking around is probably not he best idea...

Starting our day off at 7:30 am 

 

Outside of the gate to Arlington National Cemetery, our first stop of the day 

 Tricia's Turn!

 Such a sobering view..

 Fun fact about Karen: JFK was my absolute favorite president, I used this quote many times in English assignments

Tricia's favorite quote from the memorial as well.

I normally don't get all emotional or "moto" when it comes to the military, but my view of Arlington has changed drastically since my first trip to Washington DC in the eight grade. I have always appreciated those who gave the ultimate sacrifice for our freedom, but it was different this time. Maybe it was the old man we saw sitting at the grave of who we assume was his son. Maybe it was the young girl who looked about our age grieving at a grave. Maybe it was the fact that our main purpose for the trip was to lay a stone on the headstone of one of Tricia's husband's good friend who didn't make it home from his last deployment. Or maybe it was the one headstone with a photo strip of a young happy couple similar to the ones we both took with our husbands before they left on deployment. I think it was a mixture of all of the above because when we saw the photo strip of a the couple who looked the same age as us and knowing that the girl in the photo was without the love of her life, made us break down. Here we were, crying at this strangers grave because of the overwhelming emotion we were feeling. It really made us open our eyes that our boys, my brother, and even more of their friends, who might as well be family, could easily be one of these graves we were looking at. We are so fortunate that we still have then, which I think made us both cry a little more. 

Onto a little more upbeat aspect of our trip. The next stop was the International Spy Museum! We got awesome "secret identities" when we entered the museum. My name was Jane Meyer and Tricia's was Greta Schmit. We stayed in character, and may or may not have continued the use the names Jane and Greta even after we left the museum.

 You do not was to mess with us!

 On our way to see The White House, we stopped by this little building because of my love for criminal minds. It's not the BAU, but I'll settle for the plain old FBI.

 I couldn't go on a trip and not get my little nephew, Parker, something really great to wear.

 Tricia modeling little man's shirt!

 The Washington Monument!

The White House! 

We also went to The National Achieves. All we could think of was the National Treasure movie. It was a sight to see for sure though. 

After we went to the "historic" part of DC for the day, we went to the mall in Pentagon City. I absolutely loved taking the metro all over the city, I was born to be a "city" girl! We went to the hotel around 4pm, jumped in the hot tub to soak our aching feet and then ordered Chinese food to end the night. It was an amazing day! More on the rest of our trip later, so until next time! :)