While you were sleeping

I love Casting Crowns, they have such a straight way of saying things.

A few Christmas pics...

Little slide show snapping pics for the Christmas card. Note, that Toby, he's the good dog. His education helped him prep for his close up. HA!

Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow

They predicted snow today, but didn't cancel school, which I thought odd. Normally, a flake keeps the kids home. Anyway, it was raining cats and DOGS this morning, but school was open. Princess got on the bus, dropped punkin' off at preschool, and the rain changed over to snow. Took Goldie to the vet (last heartworm test: heartworm free!), and it was starting to stick to the grass. Went into work, and stayed about 2 hrs, and they started closing schools. Came home, drank hot chocolate. It snowed for awhile, then back to rain. When the rain quit, we played in what was left of the snow. If the rain hadn't started, we probably would have had 3-4 inches! But instead, we just had one at our house.

I can't find a baby Jesus anywhere.

Seriously, a nice, not cheesy, or blow up manger scene for the yard. No one has one. Whats Christmas without Baby Jesus? If you know of one that doesn't cost a gazillion dollars, shoot me a comment.

We took the girls to the Nativity Lutheran Church tonight, they had a live Nativity scene and story telling. Pretty neat. The kids enjoyed the live animals and the reading of the story. And they gave them free cookies...and a nativity door hanger scene with stickers for them to create there own nativity. Looks like the beginining of a new Alley tradition.

10.2 miles...

In a day. The meeting I went to was over at noonish, & our flight wasn't scheduled to leave until 9p. So we had a long time we could check out DC. I was searched and scanned so many times during the day, one would think I could have earned clearance to the White House!

First stop, Arlington. Arlington was almost too much for me. Beautiful, yet haunting at the same time. *Warning* potientally offensive comment* I think any American who has EVER had anything bad to say about our country, our leaders, our wars, or our military, ought to be required to visit Arlington National Cemetary, to just see how MANY brave men and women have willing given up their lives so we can stay free. And they should realize, the number of graves there, pales in comparison to the total number of lives lost. You can disagree with me on many things, but the enormity of the sacrifice of our armed forces can NOT be denied. Ok, I feel better. I was proud of my fellow Americans who were there...all were respectful and silent. Not one cell phone...not one loud annoying converstation...I didn't think Americans had it in them any more, but the ones there did.

After we left Arlington, we rode the Metro into the city, where embarked on a worldwind tour of the Washington Mall. First stop, the Smithsonian Museum of American History. We saw the Gettyburg Address, in Lincoln's hand, the flag that flew over Ft McHenry that inspired the Star Spangled Banner (I had no idea it was so large!), a great exhibit on America's Armed Forces, and their history from Pre-revolution through today. I didn't realize how powerful that would be...maybe it was coming from Arlington. I also didn't realize I was going to come up on relics from 9/11 in that exhibt . Very moving. Then at the end there was a video of still photography off cemetaries around the world for American Service men and women. Also moving.

After there, we went to the Museum of Natural History. Also cool, lots of good stuff in that one too. Of course, me being a biologist, I could have stayed in there for days. But we did see the gems too, including the Hope Diamond, and the crystal room..I could have stayed there for days too.

After that, we walked up to the Capitol, and went to check out the Christmas tree, the preperations for the inaguration, and talked to a really nice Capitol Police cop. We talked to him for about 10-15 mins. We were asking directions to the new visitor center...you know the one people were talking about last week because the congressmen wouldn't have to "smell" the tourists anymore? Anyway, he told us how to get there, and we were talking to him about how beautiful everything was, and about the inaguration, etc. He told us they were expecting people to fill the Washington Mall, from the a capital to the lincoln memorial!! Estimate 4 million people if the weather is nice. WOW! Got some photos of the prep work around the capital, and the Christmas tree. Walked around to the back, and found out while we were talking to the cop the last tour had left for the inside, so we didn't get to go in. :( I was bummed. But the new visitors center is nice, and has some neat stuff in it anyway. You can see the stage they are building for the inaguration in the picture below:

From there, we saw the Supreme Court

& Library of Congress Buildings.

Wandered into the Smithsonian Museum of the American Indian, and then into the Air & Space museum. We had planned to walk back to the White House and Washington Monument to see the National Tree, since it was about dusk, but we were tooooo tired. Got back on the Metro and went back to Crystal City, where we rounded up our luggage and went to the airport.

After sitting there forever, we discovered our plane was delayed. :-( It finally arrived, and we boarded, and were delayed again because the fuel truck had broken down next to the plane. Finally got undeway and hour late, and as we took off I could see the Lincoln memorial, Washington Monument, and the White House, along with the lit up National Christmas tree. It was beautiful!

Slept on the plane...

And I'm so tired and sore today! I can tell I walked 10 miles. (pedometer on cell phone).

And of course...the kids wanted to put the Christmas Tree and lights up today, so we did!

More DC experience

I forgot to mention last night that while we were in front of the White House taking pictures, we flagged down a "cop" to ask for recommendation for food...a 'la Rachel Ray. Turned out it was Secret Service! Anyway, he was super nice, and recommended a nearby by place that was great.

The White House was having a "fancy" dinner with all these folks in "fancy" clothes going through security. Too cool!

washington dc

Flew into DC today. After the first meeting, we had a little bit of time to walk around before dark, so I was able to snap a few pics. Hopefully I'll get to more later!