Two weeks ago I spent a long weekend in Washington, DC with my oldest friend, Debbie.  (Oldest as in “I have known her since birth”, not oldest as in age.  She is actually 3 months younger than me.)  I’ve asked Debbie to share about our time together.  Heeeeere’s Debbie!

“My dear friend, Becky, and I recently took a trip to Washington, DC, thanks to the wonderful generosity of our sweet husbands, who gave us the gift at Christmas and graciously watched our kids for 4 days while we were gone.  Since neither of us had been to DC since we were kids, and really didn’t remember very much from our previous visits, we had a lot to choose from in terms of sight-seeing.  But, since part of the fun of the weekend was catching up and chatting, we decided not to pack too terribly much into our 2 days of DC.

Some of the highlights were the Mall area with the Washington and Lincoln Memorials, the “1^st Ladies Exhibit” at the Museum of American History, Arlington Cemetery (and the changing of the guard), the Holocaust Museum (it is hard to call this a highlight, but it was enlightening and good to do, even though a bit of a “downer”), and Georgetown Cupcakes.  Becky was “sweet” enough to stand in line for 30 minutes just to get in the store, even though she had never seen the show (DC Cupcakes on TLC).  The cupcakes were good enough, but it was just as much fun to be able to say that “I have been there!”.

I must say that the good food we ate over several days was a highlight for me, too.  I obviously enjoy cupcakes, but who knew that a hole-in-the-wall chili restaurant would be such a great find.  Having my first taste of Bison was pretty amazing, too, as was eating at a restaurant in the back of a book store.  (Thanks to Becky’s friend, Laura, for that recommendation!).

With the weekend behind me, I do have a few comments and suggestions for any of you who might be heading to DC anytime soon:

*Public transportation will probably take you twice as long to get somewhere as you think it will.
*Make sure you always have plenty of coins on you, because you never know when you will need them.
*If you can afford a hotel very close to a metro station, it will be well worth the money.
*Riding on a bus at night isn’t too bad, as long as you are with a friend who is much braver than you.
*If you wait long enough at a bus stop, the bus will eventually come.
*The Mall area downtown is MUCH bigger in person than on a map—so wear comfortable shoes!
*If you have a good zoom on your camera, you don’t actually have to get very close to the White House or the Jefferson Memorial to see them.
*DC is a beautiful and impressive place and everyone should go there at some point!”

Thanks, Debbie! Stay tuned for later this week when I will write my own thoughts on our time together.  You’ll wish you’d been there!

Our closest free-standing Chick-fil-a turned one last week.  You know how I love birthdays.  When I heard that a homemade birthday card would pay for a sandwich, dinner was planned.  Leave it to a favorite restaurant to combine two of my other favorite things: celebrating and creating.

Once Bubba got home from school I gathered the children around the kitchen table, explained the plan, and let them loose with the markers.  While each party lovin Picasso got to work, I enjoyed creating a card of my own and one for Honey; we did  discuss that “Daddy would write the note because he needed to be involved in the creating of his card!”

Little went with simplicity:

KB created and dictated:

Bubba . . . well it’s hard to make a cute phrase that means “Bubba was committed to filling every inch of space with words.”

Apparently EVERY OTHER PERSON IN OUR TOWNSHIP had the same idea because we could barely get in the door and order.  We got the food to go, chatted with a few people we knew, and came home to eat.   Another successful Chick-fil-a experience.

When was the last time you went to Chick-fil-a?

While visiting family we had one night for the adults to go out together sans the kiddos.  It was super fun.  My mom had another Groupon (woohoo, mom!) and we went to this seafood place, Capt. Morgan’s.

Now, I went to Troy State University and we know most Jimmy Buffet songs and all Garth Brooks songs, so I am familiar with Capt. Morgan from “Two Pina Coladas”.  My sister tells us all about commercials that show people standing with one knee up, like the Capt.(?), and she giggles and giggles because it is apparently a funny commercial.  I just think it’s a super photo op.  My daddy even played along.

I couldn’t find the commercial she was talking about, but I did find this and it’s worth a giggle: