Fits two people? Really?

I meant to post this photo weeks ago, after our D.C. vacation, but had forgotten about it until now.

Here's Jack peering into the bathysphere on display at the National Geographic Society:

Hulkamania?

So, I'm eating breakfast at the hotel in D.C. last week and I see on CNN (or MSNBC or Fox or *insert cable news channel*) that there was going to be an "evangelical rally" on the Mall that day. Turns out The Call was in town. Great.

So, the kids and I take the metro down to the Mall and sure enough we're bombarded by pamphleteers as we leave the metro stop. I managed to fend off the hoard without taking a single "You're going to burn in hell" flyer/newspaper/brochure. As we move away from the crowd I see a monstrosity of a stage set up by the Capitol - it looked like a Def Leppard concert (no offense to Def Leppard) - and we hear someone on stage yelling and carrying on about something. Honestly, I have no idea what the guy was saying, but the tone and rhythm sent chills down my spine - it's hard to explain, but it was some combination of anger, insanity, and overacting (I hate to suggest this, but check out the video on the right side of the Call's website I linked to above to hear what I mean). I suppose, unsurprisingly, evangelical is the best word to describe it. The guy could have been reading directly from Isaac Newton's Principia and it would have sounded just as scary-insane.

Actually, now that I think about it, the whole thing reminded me of something like this

So, what did the kids and I do? Walked straight across the Mall to the Museum of Natural History, of course, and took part in, among many other things, the Mammal Family Reunion.

Run away! Run Away!

Lincoln Memorial

D.C. Vacation

The whole fam damily is headed to D.C. for a few days of vacation before the school year starts up again. Here's a short list of things we'll hopefully be getting to:

National Aquarium in Baltimore

National Zoo

Smithsonian Natural History Museum

various monuments (Emma really wants to see the one with "Abraham Lincoln sitting down")

The White House (as opposed to say, a beach volleyball match in Beijing)

I'm open to other suggestions if you've got them (remember, we'll be dealing with a 4- and 7-year old). Em heard from a friend who heard from a friend that the Spy Museum was fun - anyone have first-hand experience and care to corroborate this?

Packing for the D.R.

Do I need anything else?