The SMITHSONIAN, part 1
This week we headed to DC on the first of a handful of Smithsonian visits. The Smithsonian Institution museum complex in Washington DC consists of 16 museums and the National Zoo. (I didn't know that before this week. I thought it was one museum.) All the museums are located in or near the National Mall, which is a sprawling green space between the Capital and the Washington Monument that is surrounded on all sides by historical sites and museums. (I hadn't even heard of the National Mall before this week.) You could literally spend days in almost every museum (especially because they are all free), but with three tiny ones, that isn't really possible. So, we're hitting them a handful at a time. This week we visited:
The Castle (aka Smithsonian Institution Building) was built from 1847-1853 and houses the main Smithsonian Visitor's Center. They have a small handful of exhibits, but the only one we really took time to walk through was "American Heroes of the Olympic Spirit". The exhibit was showcasing 49 Olympic medals dating back to the 1940s and 4 torches. That was exciting, considering that the Beijing Summer Games are starting in a week!
Smithsonian Gardens
Surrounding the Castle are various complex gardens that I was going to write all about before I realized that probably no one but me really cares about. They were beautiful. One day I'm going to have an amazing garden like that. And I'm going to have a gardener to boss around and make do all the yucky work. :)
A squirrel Sease & Lije befriended
Hirshhorn Sculpture Garden
Large modern art sculptures. Brain cells depleted. Need I say more?
(Okay, so even though my husband is an artist, we both agree that modern art is mostly nuts. Sorry if you like it and I offended you. Well, sort of sorry. I'm not too sorry yet. I'll work on it.)
The National Air and Space museum boasts the largest collection of air and spacecraft in the world. Better yet, almost all of them are either originals or backups to the originals. As you first walk into the central atrium you are immediately surrounded by the "Milestones of Flight" exhibit. Both on the floor and hanging from the rafters are some of the most important air and space artifacts in history, including The Spirit of St. Louis (the plane Charles Lindbergh flew for the first solo flight across the Atlantic) and the command module of Apollo 11 (the Neal Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin one). They also have an Apollo Lunar Module, which the missions used to fly from their craft to the moon and back. This museum was fascinating!
The Spirit of St. Louis
Apollo Lunar Module
The National Museum of Natural History was established in 1910 and has over 125 million specimens of rocks, fossils, plants, animals, etc. It is the second most popular Smithsonian museum (Air and Space is the first). The kids disagree with that statistic, though, because this one definitely got a first place rating from them! It has a huge amount of exhibits, and all about things they know, so they were wildly entertained.
The Hall of Mammals was fun because they kids recognized the rhino, giraffe, elephant, etc. The Hall of Dinosaurs not so much because the kids don't recognize dinos without their skin on (Seara got a brief lesson on bones). There was an Ocean Views photography exhibit that Elijah loved because of all the "Nemos" (aka fish). And the Hall of Minerals was hilarious because Seara had never seen colored rocks before. She kept calling out, "Purple rock!" and "Pink rock!" Then there was the Hall of Gems (which includes the Hope Diamond). I never used to understand what the big deal was with women and jewelry. I wear a wedding ring. That's it. No watch, no earrings, no rings, no bracelets, no necklaces. My eyes have been opened.
The jewels that converted me
The highlight of it all, though, was the Butterfly Pavilion. The temporary exhibit is a small, enclosed, tropical pavilion where hundreds of butterflies from about 30 species fly around freely. Tickets to enter the pavillion were $6 per adult, $5 per child. But we struck gold and happened to show up on the day they were letting people in for FREE! So, all of Seara's birthday dreams came true and she got to be surrounded by hundreds of butterflies of all different sizes and colors. One almost landed on her foot! It was amazing!
One of the hundreds of butterflies
10 comments:
Okay. You are amazing and completely insane. Your baby is how old??? How are you willing and able to do all this? Like I said, amazing and insane.
Sounds like we need to visit and have you show us around.
I love the Smithsonian museums! I've been there several times and still not seen all I want to see!
Oh, I love DC so much! How 'bout we switch places for a weekend? :) I'm glad you guys are able to be seeing some sights there, especially with the baby! You're great!
That looks like such a fun trip! Everything is more fun on the east coast! We have not even congratulated you on the baby! We sure miss you guys! Congrats on your beautiful family!
Looks like you guys had so much fun! I'm with ya about the whole jewelry thing - I only wear my wedding ring & that is it, but those jewels are beautiful!
i can't believe you are going out like this w/such a little baby! you are so brave! i am just now feeling comfortable about going out for more than a few hours at a time...you're SUPER mom!!!
looks like you are making some awesome east coast memories!
:)
Seriously Janae, how is it possible you do these things? It reminds me of the line in Finding Nemo when the dad says to Nemo "You think you can do these things Nemo, but you can't!" Except that you CAN Janae! Thanks for sharing the great post!
I have a few comments:
You are so brave taking two kids and a tiny baby to see museums. We have been to a museum in KC with Asa and that's scary enough. We haven't done anything that adventurous with Judah yet.
I don't know about modern art sculptures, but I really like Jackson Pollock's paintings. I think part of the reason is that James does mostly abstract paintings.
Finally, don't you love the double stroller? James says it's the final bullet in the quest for coolness.
I have been to the natural history and air and space when I visited the Bakers, so it was fun to see pictures. Brought back some good memories. I am so glad you are taking these excursions.
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