Family Trip – Day 2

Today we got up early and went to church in Rootstown, OH.  The ward was very small.  We added quite the number to it.  🙂   We ended up only staying for Sacrament Meeting, much to the chagrin of the Young Women’s President who thought we were a new move-in family and she just got 3 more girls in her group!  🙂  I think we would have increased their program by about a third!  🙂

We continued on driving through Ohio, Pennsylvania, and into Maryland for the rest of the day.  What was really cool is that since we went through there last time, they have upgraded the systems to accept our Illinois I-Pass to be accepted the whole way.  Not once did we have to stop and pay cash for tolls!  We were pretty happy about that!

At about 5 we arrived at the Washington DC temple.  We ate some food and then browsed around the visitor center.  The last time Kirstyn was there, she was about 2 and didn’t remember it.  Sarah and Brittany did, but everyone was still in awe at the site of the beautiful building!

After touring through the visitor’s center and walking around the temple grounds, we took a drive around the surrounding area for awhile.  We had an hour to kill before we attended a concert there at the visitor’s center from the Washington DC Area Mormon Orchestra.  We saw some really cool buildings (a whole complex to be exact) that at one time was a recuperation center for veterans of the WWII.  They are right next to the Walter Reed Army Medical Center.  These buildings are now privately held and being sold in little pieces for people to purchase, remodel, and live in.  There was a full Japanese pagoda, a windmill, and all other kinds of crazy shaped and sized buildings.

We got back from our drive just in time to go to the visitor’s center and attend the orchestra concert.  The group was very good and we enjoyed it very much!  Brittany was on the edge of her seat loving every minute of it.  She really does enjoy playing the violin.  I think that it’s just the lack of wanting to practice that gets her discouraged sometimes!  🙂

After the concert, we drove to our hotel out in Fairfax, VA.  We were dead tired when we arrived.  We are very impressed with the hotel (Marriott Spring Hill Suites).  The accommodations are GREAT and there is plenty of room for us all.  The kids were very impressed!  They have never stayed in such a nice hotel and it was funny to see their reaction!  🙂