Monday, July 10, 2017

MAY We Demolish the Kitchen? Yes, you MAY!

May 4 - Actually I just want to remember how this silly boy sits straight up with his legs outstretched not touching the ground on grass, carpet, wood, anything. No adult can do this.
We also finally had a very late Easter Egg hunt.
May 7 - We officially start to demo the kitchen, box things and store them in the Mama/Dada room, move stuff to the mud room and tear out cabinets!
May 13 - More demo
and we go out to eat at Pacific Grill with our friends the Wells for our 17th anniversary!
May 14 - The kids get to meet their new cousin for the first time on Mother's Day!
May 15 - Tile removal! The kids were amazing! The jack hammer was not. It broke about 4 different times.
May 16 -  More tile removal in the dining room now, after a crowded breakfast in the living room.

After two days of extreme hard work. Dada took the kids to pizza. Not just any pizza, really, really big pizza! AND he bought them another Switch!!! - Say, Whaaaaaaat? (Said in a Tuff super high voice, which is what he does all the time after saying, "Boom, boom. Shake the room.")

Eben's DC Trip!

And now it is my turn to type. And my means Eben, who is me. So I had a really fun time in DC, although I think I liked New York better, but we don't have too many pictures of New York unfortunately. That trip is definitely a trip that I'll remember.
The scariest part of the whole thing was probably when Dada took me to the airport to fly down to CA. After that, I spent a few days down there with Nonnie and Poppie and Mimi. Nonnie and another tour guide named Jeff flew to DC a day early because that had to get their tour stuff ready. Then, the next day Jeff's daughter Jordy and I flew over.
The next day, first thing in the morning we went to have breakfast at Mt. Vernon. Then we went around, and looked at everything, including George Washington's grave.

The space and flight museum is apparently the most visited Smithsonian of all, and it was really fun. After that museum, everyone went to the huge McDonalds in the museum for lunch, but Nonnie, Jeff, Annette (another tour guide), Jeff, Jordy and I went across the street to the art museum, where we got lost trying to find the cafeteria. We finally did find it and ate lunch there.
 We went to the Ford Theater, where Lincoln was shot, and a guy gave a speech about it. Then we went across the street to the boarding house where he died, and walked through it. There was a giant tower of books all about him just outside the gift shop.
At the end of that day, we went to see Iwo Jima, and it was pretty cool. It was designed so that as you drove around it, it looked like the statues were raising up the flag.
The next day we went to Arlington National Cemetery, which was one of my favorite parts. There, we saw the changing of the guard at the tomb of the unknown soldier. We also saw the eternal flame at Kennedy's memorial.

 Then we went to the capital, which is why we all dressed up nice. It was pretty cool we had to wear headphones that let us here the guides voice more loudly. We also saw the supreme court.

 This picture is from the natural history museum. We took it for Opal.
This is me in front of the Washington Column at the WW2 memorial. I also saw the Lincoln memorial, Korean war memorial and the Jefferson memorial.

  The national spy museum was probably the coolest museum I've been through. I was the fastest at defusing bombs, and one of the only people able to hang on to a oily, moving bar for 60 seconds. The other two people were Annette, and the principal of the school that we went with.
We visited the FDR memorial where there were lots of coolio fountains and statues. I liked the fountains better, but I only got pictures with the statues.
The Air Force memorial was super cool. The Martin Luther King Jr. memorial was good too, but not as great as the Air Force one. I'll let you figure out which is which.

The pentagon was also pretty cool. The guides there walk the entire tour backwards, without ever looking behind them, and the tour is one and a half miles long! Also, before you actually started the tour, you had to completely shut off your phones, otherwise they would confiscate it.
On the way up to New York, we stopped in Gettysburg PA, to see the battlefield of Gettysburg, and an awesome circlerama painting thing. And also the best fudge ever.
I got to go see Wicked that night, which was obviously my favorite part of the trip. We also had dinner at a place called John's Pizza, which was rated best pizza in New York. That little tennis ball guy is named the Ginga Ninja. While we walked through New York, I was with Nonnie in the front holding him up so no one got lost. (He's on an extendable selfie stick)

For breakfast the next day, we went on a boat, and then danced on the boat, and saw the statue of liberty from the boat! It was a cool boat.

Us on the subway in NY. We went on it twice, and it be goin' fast.
St. Paul's Chapel was great because I got to see someone playing the theremin, which is an awesome instrument that you should totally google right now.
The stock market was crowded. But there were some cool street performers.
 And that's my trip to DC. Below is our group photo in Times Square, my favorite location on the trip. I'm so happy to have a Nonnie that let's me do these kind of things. Back to you Mama!

While Eben and Nonnie were in DC, Dodie and Cheese had their baby!
Sweet baby Styrkur. Mama was blessed to be able to attend the whole birth of her first little nephew!