Easter in DC

We woke up on Easter morning to some photos of Alex opening his Easter "basket" we sent down. It had about 5 pounds of candy in it. That's not a lie. (Admission: it started out with 6 pounds but it sat around our house waiting to be delivered a little too long.)

CANDY!

Check out my cool basket!

My sister found this "basket" online and had it personalized for the little guy. I thought that was pretty neat! I think he had a good Easter morning! (Note: I miss the old days of Easter egg hunts at Aunt Phyllis and Uncle Burr's house myself. I loved those days, Mom!)

My Easter love

It felt a little funny not to have a church to go to on Easter morning, but we still celebrated the risen Lord in our own way. We enjoyed seeing all of the families dressed up around town as we walked around seeing more sights. We had a quick lunch at a place called "Nando's PERi-PERi" which serves some of the best chicken we'd ever had. It was a real departure from our "normal" restaurants, but it was a pleasant surprise. I highly recommend giving on their restaurants a try if you're ever out East. Yum! 

We took the Metro into town to see Dupont Circle. I think we'd seen it before but I couldn't remember and I wanted to walk from there to see Embassy Row. It was all so quaint and neat. We just love D.C. and could not have asked for better weather. We wandered through a farmer's market. We sat at a coffee shop and people watched (OK, it was a Starbucks. Again. It was near Embassy Row, though, so it counts as a coffee shop and not just a strip mall place serving over-priced mochas!).  

This photo doesn't do the quaint neighborhood justice. At all. Loved it.

If this is not an American home, I don't know what is. LOVE!

Once we'd had our fill of exploring D.C. we headed back to the Pentagon to make the 1+ mile trek UPHILL, in the heat of the sun, to return to our hotel. (Note: It was a piece of cake this time. Amazing what the human body can adjust to! If I had to make that trek everyday I think my butt would look like J. Lo.'s.) Anyway, we hung at the hotel a bit and then opted to go back to Pentagon Row to sit in the sun and people watch. Our legs were about spent after walking more than 25 miles in 3 days. That is not an exaggeration. I wore a pedometer each day, friends. 

Our new friend, Susan. Yep. Susan.

We enjoyed the Pentagon Row area so much. They had comfortable places to sit in the sun and all kinds of restaurants to enjoy. We met a little dog, Susan (pictured above), and petted her while missing MacKenzie. (Note: I am shocked at how some parents take their children to a public place and just leave them to play. This one little kid was basically attacking Susan and poor Susan's owner was having a hard time straightening out some stranger's kid. You know the very same parents would have had a fit if little Susan got scared and bit their kid, but they were not stopping him from tormenting the poor dog. It just isn't right. End of nervous pet owner rant.) 

My happy place: nose in a book, sun on my back.

The outdoor sofas at Pentagon Row were amazing and I made myself right at home with the book "All You Could Ask For" by Mike Greenberg. Yes, Mike Greenberg of Mike & Mike in the morning on ESPN. I love that guy! (The book was so good that I could not put it down and read the whole thing that day. I highly recommend it for a quick, sweet read.) What does Jackson do when I lose myself in a book? He plays on his phone reading articles and such. He tries to talk to me and gets ignored. He walks around the area looking for places to have dinner. He tries to talk to more again and still gets ignored. He plays with random dogs. He asks at 5:00 when I'll be available to hang out again. I say 6:30. He sits quietly until 6:30 at which time he shouts about the bell ringing and challenges me to show little kids how to do cartwheels properly. I oblige him because he was so patient (except he really wasn't and I could hear him critiquing the kids' gymnastic abilities for hours while I read). Nothing makes an aging woman feel better than showing little kids how to flip themselves about properly. #NeverSlowDownNeverGrowOld

We grabbed a quick dinner and then headed to the hotel to meet up with Susie and head to the airport. It was such a nice and relaxing day that we didn't even complain too much when Susie made us get to the airport at 8:15 for our 10:00 p.m. flight. (I am so much more flexible when a good book has my full attention.) Our flight was an easy one. Jackson was so into his audio-book with his new headphones that he only bothered me two times the whole flight. It was a world record. (I've never loved my Mom more than I do now for buying him those headphones! I should have done that years ago!)

Our quick trip came to kind of a hilarious end when we got on the bus to our parking lot at midnight and realized that none of us remembered which shelter we needed to exit at the get to our vehicle. A helpful man on the bus pointed out how silly it was to park and not write down the aisle and shelter. I informed him that it was 5 a.m. Friday morning when we parked. I love helpful fellow travelers. ;) We eventually found Susie's car and got home and to bed by 1:30 this morning. Yes, we like to get everything that we can out of our trips away. No, we are not well-rested today. It was worth it, though, to spend some days people watching, sightseeing and reading in the sun!