Weekdays Away

John attended a two-day training for work on Monday and Tuesday in Arlington. We took advantage of the location to head up there as a family and visit a couple of John's relatives and some dear friends of ours. We never imagined that traveling with four people required so much preparation, packing, and just plain stuff. It will never cease to amaze how the smallest people require the most amount of stuff. Gone are the days of throwing a couple days worth of stuff in a backpack and setting off.

We definitely enjoyed our time away. The Bredbenners have three kids (ages 6, 3, and 3 months), so it was great fun for Brennan to have some playmates around and Owen to have another baby to look at. Monday afternoon, we packed up all the kids and headed out to pick up John. Then it was off to a fun evening in DC (with not so fun traffic and parking), complete with a picnic dinner in the Haupt Garden and then a brief tour through the Museum of Natural History.

The Smithsonian Information Center, right in front of our picnic spot

This life-sized elephant was ready to greet us once we entered the museum

Brennan was pretty excited about the elephant!

Getting to see a T-Rex up close and personal. When Brennan was little, he used to make these growling noise, so we called him our "Brenna-sauras Rex." It's fun that Brennan got to see the dinosaur that his nickname came from.

Outside the museum

Five kiddos!