Wednesday, December 18, 2013

DC Part 1

Last week I was lucky enough to join Doug on a trip to DC for some training he had to go to. Lewis got to come along too! Don't let this smile deceive you.  This baby was not to happy to be riding on a plane.
 We found these notes in our luggage.  Sure love that girl
The hotel we stayed at had all this cool president stuff in it.  I thought it added to the whole experience and was fun to see.
We got in late at night so the next morning I woke up bright and early and headed to the archives.  It was so awesome!  Even though it was absolutely freezing in DC it really was such a good time to go.  Nothing was crowded!  I was able to reserve a tour online before we went so we got to go in before the rest of the public. There were only about 5 of us in the rotunda where the Declaration of Independence, Constitution and Bill of Rights are.  I don't know for sure because this was my first time there but I'm going to guess that it's pretty rare to have it so empty.  I was surprised at how faded the Declaration is.  I also learned that the last signature didn't go on until 1781.  Until that time it had been carted around to all the different delegates to get them to sign it.  I guess that's part of the reason why it's so faded.  That and the fact that it's like 250 years old. It was crazy how much clearer the Constitution was though.  I also learned that the founding fathers didn't expect the Constitution to uphold past their generation.  Pretty crazy to think about too!
After that I headed to the American History Museum where I saw things like Michelle Obama's inaugural dress,
Mary Lincoln Todd's white house china,
the ruby slippers
Kermit,
And a sunstone from the Nauvoo Temple.
After that museum I headed to the Library of Congress.  It was amazing!!! My sister-in-law works for Jim Matheson (US House) and before we left I kind of joked with her about getting us some tours.  She contacted someone in his DC office and she was able to get us a capitol tour, a white house tour and another tour that we could choose (Library of Congress, Bureau of Engraving and Printing, State Dept, Pentagon or Supreme Court).  My first choice wasn't available so she set one up at the Library of Congress. I was so glad that she did!  It seriously did not disappoint.  If you're ever in DC you have to go here! The architecture and murals were absolutely amazing.
This is the cupola in the main reading room. You can't even see the very top of it unless you're in the room.  You can't go in the room unless you have a card.  We found out that anyone can get a card as long as they have a photo ID.  Doug and I got a card but actually didn't end up going back. Maybe next time.  The circle thing with the people in it was kind of a timeline of the birth of America and different countries that we borrowed things from.  The person representing America kind of had the profile of a young Abraham Lincoln.  It was pretty cool.  There were also really cool statues of goddesses and famous people in history throughout the room.  There were 2 real people for every goddess.  One historical and one contemporary. For example on either side of the goddess of poetry there was Shakespeare and Plato.  It was fun to see all the different people that were represented.
More of the main reading room.  There were books in each one of those little archways.  So many books. I learned it's the biggest library in the world!
That's a lot of books.
This bible was huge!  It was all handwritten on linen and was pretty cool to see.
This was another cool bible to see.
There were a lot of other really cool things that we saw that we couldn't take pictures of.  There was Thomas Jefferson's library (he donated 6,000 books to the library.  Half of them burned in a fire but it was still pretty cool to see the other half).  I stole this picture from the internets. All the books were kind of arranged in a spiral. It was cool. I also saw the Gettysburg Address and a map from 1507 that was the first map to have America written on it.  Pretty cool.
Lewis wasn't quite sure what he thought of the whole thing.
Cool murals on the ceiling.
After that I went back to meet Doug and we had a delicious dinner at this place.
On the way back to the hotel I stopped at Ford's Theatre. It was a pretty amazing place to see too!
I asked one of the guides if anything was original. He said the photo of Washington that you can kind of see in the middle of this photo is original to the theatre and hung there.
This is where Lincoln was sitting when he was shot.
Across the street from the theater is the house where Lincoln actually died.  This is the lobby of that house. This sign says something about how Mary Todd sat here to greet visitors.
This was the room where he died.
Some neat mourning cards and real pressed flowers that sat on his coffin.
tassles from his coffin.
They also have a cool museum where they had this stack of books.  Every book in this stack is about Lincoln. Crazy!

This is what the house looks like where he died.
Random window display made out of chocolate!
Doug and I in front of the theatre.
After dinner Doug and I went to check out the Portrait Gallery.  It was huge!
It had this cool atrium in the middle.
There were portaits of a lot of historical people including Joseph Smith and Brigham Young.  There was also a lot of crazy artwork like this.
This was some sort of altar thing that some guy built entirely out of aluminum foil. It was crazy and huge! I think it said it filled his garage.
We also Kathrine Hepburn's Academy Awards.
This one was supposed to be at the beginning but it shows more of the president stuff in our hotel room.  This was the wallpaper on the back of the tiny closet!
And a cute Lewis lounging in the chair in our room.


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