Washington D.C. Vacation, Part 1

We spent our Fall Break on a cross country trek to Washington D.C. Originally, we planned to take the kids last Spring, but things were still pretty shut down, so we rescheduled for Fall. We had gorgeous weather during our trip, made precious family memories, and learned a lot about our country. We had a great trip!

We started our trip early Saturday morning and drove six hours to St. Louis for our first stop- the City Museum. Matt has talked about wanting to take the kids to the City Museum for years, and I'm glad it worked out to add the stop to our trip. The City Museum was different than what I was expecting (I thought it'd be more like a traditional children's museum). Really, what it was, was a giant building covered in tunnels and narrow crawl spaces. It had a huge outdoor climbing area too, and a rooftop with slides and a ferris wheel. 

The kids immediately went to climbing and exploring. Keeping an eye on all of them in an unfamiliar place was a chore, whew!

The slides were super fun- fast and steep. The kids talked me into riding this one with them. 

Our brave Katherine never let her small size stop her from attempting to climb and ride everything the museum had to offer. She's a determined little girl. I love that about her. 

We packed a lunch for the day and ate in the parking lot for a short break and then went back to exploring. There were lots of little rooms and areas we kept finding with random things to play or see. 

We bought tickets to the rooftop area and had fun on the big slide, ferris wheel and playing on the bus (Katherine's favorite)

I assumed we'd have to pry the kids away from the museum when it was time to hit the road, but they all agreed we could leave about 3:30 that afternoon. They'd seen most of the museum, and I think they were all tired. Once you've crawled through so many tunnels, it loses the appeal, I guess.  We said goodbye to the museum and continued on our journey. 

We planned to drive about three more hours that afternoon and stopped for the night in Jasper, Indiana. For a lot of our travel days, I packed a tub and an ice chest with food for our meals. It saved us a lot of money and time. Once we checked into our hotel in Indiana, we ate dinner and then headed out to find some ice cream. The kids always ensure we follow Daddy's vacation rule of eating ice cream everyday. 

Since I thought we'd leave the museum a few hours later than we actually did, we were able to relax and put the kids to bed at a decent time Saturday night which was different than our usual vacation travel routine.

We woke up early Sunday morning and continued our journey toward Williamsburg, VA. We decided to splurge since we got an early start and stopped for breakfast at Cracker Barrel.

We stopped at a rest area in Virginia and ate lunch. Virginia had beautiful rest areas. I'd never driven through that part of the country before. The trees and hills were beautiful (though the hills and curvy roads weren't our favorite)

We made it to our hotel in Williamsburg around 5:00 that afternoon. We unpacked and headed to explore Colonial Williamsburg. We bought tickets for a junior ghost walk tour later that evening. We didn't have much time before our tour to grab dinner, so we stopped for some ice cream to hold us over until after the tour. 

The kids enjoyed the ghost walk. I think they all (except Katherine) hoped it would be a little spookier, but they keep talking about the ghost stories they heard, so I'd call it a success. The story tellers did a great job, and it was a fun activity to do the night before our big day in Williamsburg. 

We hoped to eat a nice dinner after the ghost walk, but all the restaurants nearby had really long wait times, so we ended up just finding a Wendys and let the kids eat in the car to end our night. We all went to bed happy to be out of the car and looking forward to a fun day ahead.