Nation's Capitol

Can i just reiterate how much I LOVE the 4th of July!! I know I say it every year, but it is just that awesome to me. Honestly, I was a little down this year not knowing what it would be like here in a new place. We decided that since we live so close to DC that we might as well go see how the capitol celebrates.

It was quite the day! We left after breakfast and rode the metro into the city. There was a fun parade down Constitution Ave about 5 minutes after we got there. It turned out perfect since we were able to find a place to see.

It was pretty cool to be in DC for this important American holiday.

The weather was the best too. No more 100+ with crazy humidity. It was a beautiful 80 with a breeze. Couldn't have had a better day. After the parade. We ate our picnic lunch and explored the mall area where they had a big folk festival going on. It focused on Kenya and China. There were lots of hand on areas with activities for kids.

Craft area with clay for sculpting and markers for coloring.

Neil made a snowman.

Claire made...a red crayon....

Once we had done lots of crafts we headed into the Museum of Art to look around in the AC. There were some pretty old and neato things in there. We didn't even see it all. After looking around we made our way to Subway to grab some dinner to go. Then we hiked down to the Lincoln Memorial to find a place to wait for the show. We spent the evening sprawled out on the grass, eating our dinner, wrestling, playing in the dirt, reading books, and people watching. 

In the last 30 minutes of waiting I broke out the glow sticks and candy. We all loaded up on the sugar crack and got ready for the firework show.

The sun finally went down. The sky was beautiful. Then the fireworks started.

The pictures don't do it justice at all. This was hands down the most impressive firework show that I have ever seen. They did cool ones that spelled out USA and even ones that did shapes like stars. There were many, many displays that I have never seen before. It was crazy how good this show was. Totally worth waiting for all day. It was amazing. So cool to be where we were celebrating the fourth. 

I loved it!

Afterwards we walked about a mile to the nearest metro station. There were lines of course but we only waited about 5-10 minutes until we were through and onto a train headed home. The train was super packed, but we got on and we made it. I was expecting much worse. It was nothing like inauguration day. No problem. We'd totally do it again. Next time we could probably show up later in the day and be just fine. If you ever have a chance to spend the fourth in DC, I would highly recommend it.

Happy 4th of July!