Gettysburg

On Friday we drove to Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. It is about an hour and a half from here. We planned to spend the day there and then drive to Elizabethtown to spend the night with Neil's cousin David and his family. Our first stop was for lunch at the Old Spring Tavern in the town of Gettysburg. It was in the basement of an 18th century home. It was lit by candlelight and our servers were dressed in period clothing. We ate food that would have been served in the 1700's. Minus the ale, of course!

Next stop was the US Military Park, Gettysburg museum. There we watched a great film and viewed the newly restored cyclorama. It was a great way to orient us to the what happened in those three terrible days.

The battle was fought over the first three days of July 1863. It was the second time the Confederate forces invaded the North. It is often called the "High Water Mark of the Confederacy" because things started to go downhill for the South after this loss. It was at a time when the fate of the nation still hung in the balance. The loss of life here was staggering.

There were more than 50,000 casualties. Close to 9,000 were killed, 10,000 missing, and the rest injured. This little town didn't know what hit them.

There were several observation towers. We had to climb them of course.

This was a rock wall the armies built for protection. There were walls like this all over the place.

A little bit of silliness.

This is Dwight Eisenhower's retirement home. He was delighted to live on this great Civil War battlefield.

This is the National Cemetery in Gettysburg. The kids are near the spot that Abraham Lincoln delivered his famous address. I'll refrain from quoting it, but it is powerful. It is rare that so much is said with so few words. We spent about 5 hours here and barely touched the surface.

Mount Vernon

Every post is honourable in which a man can serve his country.
Letter to Benedict Arnold (September 14, 1775)

It is better to offer no excuse than a bad one. Letter to his niece, Harriot Washington (October 30, 1791)

Gentlemen, you will permit me to put on my spectacles, for, I have grown not only gray, but almost blind in the service of my country.
Statement as he put on his glasses before delivering
his response to the first Newburgh Address (March 15, 1783)

This weeping box elder tree makes a perfect hideout.

We loved Mt. Vernon. It is only about 20 minutes from our apartment. We bought a membership so we can go back again. There was so much more to see and do there that we plan to go back very soon. George Washington was truly a great man. He was born at the right time and the right place to lead our country when it was so fragile. When I read about some of the early victories of the Revolutionary War, I am convinced that they were miraculous and that this is God's plan to have a free nation.

Roosevelt Island

In the middle of the Potomac River is a beautiful green island. It was once a plantation, but has long since been dedicated to Theodore Roosevelt for his love of the outdoors and conservation. You can get to the island by walking across this bridge.

Mara was a trooper coming along with us after breaking her arm the day before. She fell off her pogo stick on the temple grounds.

In the center of the island--surprise!--is a heroic sized statue of Teddy himself! It really was a bit of a shock to see such a large memorial in the midst of all that green space. I think he would like it. Some favorite quotes:

"A man's usefulness depends upon his living up to his ideals."

"It is hard to fail but it is worse never to have tried to succeed."

Jeffrey has an inchworm. Not sure what Emily has.

We really enjoyed the walk through the woods and the swamp. We saw lots of poison ivy though. I'm glad we noticed it before the boys romped through the woods. That is the last thing we need!

Hayley has a tradition of wearing her Fort Collins High School shirt on Fridays. "FoCo Friday!"

Fresh Flowers and Fresh Fish!

The United States Botanic Garden is run by Congress. We went here on a rainy afternoon the day after we visited the zoo. It is a lovely green house full of plants from all over the world. The rooms are divided into different habitats. It was a nice place to visit on a rainy day. I would not recommend trying to complete the Junior Botanist program. I thought it would be an educational way to explore the garden, but I ended up talking to myself with my head in a notebook while the kids actually looked at the plants and flowers!

Mara liked the "old man" cactus. Jeffrey discovered the hard way that the barrel cactus has very sharp spines.

These colorful toadstools made us think of fairies.

The children's garden gave us some hands-on experience.

You don't see a pineapple plant every day! Outside of Hawaii anyway.

On the way home, Neil made a spontaneous detour to show us the fish market near the 14th Street bridge. It was quite shocking to the kids. They were already rather suspicious of seafood. Now I think they are permanently against it.


The smell about knocked us over. It lingered with us for quite some time.

How do you Zoo?

"We're going to the zoo, zoo, zoo. How about you, you, you? You can come too, too, too. We're going to the zoo, zoo, zoo!"

Hi, this is Hayley! Last week we got to go to the National Zoo! It was pretty hot outside, but the zoo was so cool that it didn't matter! It's not a very large zoo, but everything is interesting, entertaining, and educational! (Can you see the lion?)

They had a cool little clearing by one of the exhibits with chimpanzee sculptures that the kids enjoyed posing with. :) Monkey see monkey do!

This is a neat display of brain sizes of various animals and the comparison of brain size to body size. The tiny little brain that Jeffrey is feeling is the brain of a squirrel. It's pretty small, but it's huge in comparison with its body! The third brain to the right is a human brain.

This is a very strange creature related to a crocodile that is almost extinct. I had no idea that they existed at all! I thought they were just in cartoons.

This komodo dragon makes Mara look even tinier than usual!

We got to see the zoo's newest arrival and her mom! The baby is very cute. :)

This is Mark in front of a wild boar.

Jeffrey is nose to nose with an elephant shrew! The elephant shrews are so adorable and funny to watch!

Here's Mara in front of a chinchilla-like creature. They actually had a chinchilla at the zoo! It was hiding under a rock, or I would have taken a picture. All I have to say is that you know you have a wierd pet when you see one at the zoo! I miss Mossy! Did you know that chinchillas are endangered?

I love the prairie dogs at the zoo! They remind me of a hill back in Morris that was full of prairie dog holes. They are always a lot of fun to watch because they take themselves very seriously and act ridiculously!

There was a little pond that was absolutely crawling with turtles! Some of them were smaller about the size of my thumb nail. It was really incredible!

This was a really neat display demonstrating the way naked mole rats live. It was so cool! They're blind, so the had no idea that they were in plastic tubes being gawked at. One of them thought it was digging a tunnel, but it was just pushing pine shavings through the plastic tube. They are pretty strange creatures. They looked a lot like larger versions of my baby hamsters!

The beavers were really fun to watch. They were just waddling around, dragging wood to their dam, and trying to chop down trees that were covered in metal fencing. We got to watch some of the zoo-keepers come and feed them!

This is me with the hippo! We were pretty lucky to see him because they just sent him to another zoo so that they can expand the elephant exhibit.

While we were waiting to get into the panda exhibit, we decided to sit down on the bamboo fence. It almost broke!

At first, the two-year-old panda was sleeping, so we were pretty disapointed...

Thankfully he woke up before we left! He really loves his bamboo. I personally don't know how he got so fat eating that stuff.

This is daddy panda! We didn't get to get any closer to that part of the display because the mother panda is on pregnancy watch.

This is the coolest part of the zoo- we got to see the O-line! It is thick wires 45 feet off of the ground that allows the orangutans to swing from one building to the next without taking up too much room. It was so cool to be able to look up and see an orangutan swinging right overhead!

This is a huge, very hairy orangutan that we got to see while we were eating lunch. (It kinda looks like Big Foot!) Like I said, it was a pretty amazing zoo!