guesswhatigotanewcar. 1of4

as much as i loveeeeee my nissan altima, jon has been encouraging me to entertain the thought of replacing it with something a bit newer and more reliable. over thanksgiving, jon was perusing his land cruiser forum and came upon a 2010 toyota camry xle with 28,000 miles located in Virginia. he talked to the owner for a few weeks before we decided that we wanted to fly to va and get that car! (shalon from SNL) while we were in utah, we went to the bank and got everything finalized so that we could make the big purchase. we got back from UT on thursday and left sunday morning at 6am. we flew from san antonio to atlanta then from there to dayton ohio and finally from dayton to baltimore, md. 

 jon thought these m&n's were the funniest.

 the owner picked us up from the airport and drove us to his apartment in virginia. we passed the DC temple on the way! he was a really nice guy with an even nicer car. he had taken very good care of it, it is honestly like new. this is us excited about our new purchase and heading into DC!
(sun roof!)

 DC is my favorite place in america and also where we spent our 'honeymoon' when jon got back from deployment. our capital has a special place in our heart so we were sad to only be passing through. jon dropped me off at the lincoln memorial and drove around (we couldn't find parking and didn't have license plates). it was nice to be there for a few minutes, even in the dreary weather.

we got to go see these two cuties!! they are living the life in alexandria while melanie goes to GW and stephanie is a nanny. they made us an awesome dinner complete with dessert. it was so fun seeing them and catching up, i wish we could have stayed longer. stephanie, being the sweetie that she is, prepared us a road trip bag of goodies. she knew that we didn't bring anything for our road trip since we flew. it was complete with veggies, crackers, fruit, water and sweets. she is so thoughtful and motherly (always).

almost immediately after we left them, we realized that we forgot to get a picture! they sent us the one of the two of them and we sent this. good enough, haha!

we left their place and headed for Quantico, VA to see jon's gunny. it was nice to be on a marine corps base again, it felt like home and quantico is so cute and homey. it was fun seeing him and his family and hearing about what their plans are. their place was not our last stop of the night although it was already 9pm. we left quantico and headed for raleigh, NC!!!!

washington d.c. day 4.

bolling inn had overbooked their rooms. 

so, as a courtesy, they put us up in the general's house, free of charge. I was soo bummed out that we had to sleep there instead of in our original $45 room. (not! hello!) they gave us keys and directions, and lizzie, jon, and i went to check out the house. it. was. so. nice. we dropped off our belongings, and went to pick up gary and mei from the airport! it's okay that their flight was so delayed, we didn't have to get up early (sarcasm). we just listened to tunes and chatted until they landed.

this is the house the next morning. not bad, right?? i wish i had gotten photos of the bedrooms and bathrooms, but i didn't think to do that. i love the covered back porches that houses in the east/south seem to all have. Jon flipped through the guest book and saw that only ONE other enlisted family has stayed there before us. and that enlisted person was a lot higher ranking than jon is. all the rest of the family's were officers. we thought that was pretty funny, and even funnier when jon signed it "CORPORAL Jon Hagerman and family"

we only stayed one night, it was fun while it lasted!

like i said previously, a perk of having my dad travel to DC with us was having his knowledge of the city and options to do really fun things. he contacted utah's senator? to get us a private tour of the U.S. capitol! it was so awesome. our tour guide was cute, and she told us lots of fun facts about the capitol. this is us with the statue of freedom, who sits on top of the capitol. she faces the east, because "the sun doesn't set on freedom". she is 19'6" tall and no other statue in washington D.C. can be taller than she is.

this is the very center of washington d.c.'s grid. 

there are two statues for every state represented in the capitol. Philo T. Farnsworth, the 'father of television' and the other was Brigham Young, the second prophet of the LDS church.

the dome of the capitol.
it was difficult getting everything in a picture. it is huge and very beautiful. 

after the tour of the capitol, we went to the library of congress. i didn't get any pictures, but it was so cool! the architecture was amazing.

lizzie had to go to work straight from the library of congress, so the rest of us tried to see as much as we could. this is one of my favorite pictures from the trip, jon and i in front of the capitol with the washington monument behind us.

gary&mei.

we went to: the united states botanical garden.

funny photo combination.

the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum:

we ate a hearty meal, that only cost around $10. yep.

 we watched a 3D vid about the hubble telescope.

the video was so amazing! stars in 3d are so worth it.

and we explored.

we explored some more outside of the museum. walked around dc, looked at beautiful statues and architecture, and even shared messages with people who have big doors.

(as jon's punishment for making horrible faces, those photos are not going to be hidden)

after allll that walking, we decided to call it a night and head home. 

i wore my sensible shoes the entire time, and my feet STILL hurt. 

jon on the other hand....