washington D.C. day 3.

on the first and second night jon and i were in D.C., we stayed at the Red Roof Inn, located in Alexandria. it worked out really well because it was close to the metro and close to where my sister lived. sweet, sweet lizzie let us borrow her jeep for the week. it was so nice of her, we wouldn't have been able to see a lot of stuff that we did without it. 

 unsurprisingly, the red roof inn didn't offer a continental. so we drove to Bolling Air Force Base to go to their commissary for breakfast. we bought this baby food. maybe one of us ate some of it for breakfast? i cannot confirm nor deny this.

after we ate, we parked the car in some sketchy neighborhood and jumped on the metro!
we made a quick stop at the museum of natural history. i hate to say it, but it was subpar compared to the one in manhattan. it was fun though, and the two of us learned a lot...

this looks busy, but its not nearly as confusing as the nyc subway.
(okay, enough of the comparisons.) 

 we zipped our way to arlington national cemetery. this is such a serene place to be. i was somewhat disappointed with the dead grass, but it was beautiful nonetheless. 

the iwo jima memorial. i've seen it before, but i had forgotten how big it was. and it has so much more meaning now. it was awesome to be there with my marine. 

it was ridiculously hot.
every morning, when we left our room, we'd take 3 bottles of water each.
this is us taking a break. when we first got to arlington, we thought it'd be possible to skip the bus ride and just walk. after we walked to the marine corps memorial, we knew that we wouldn't be able to see everything if we walked. anddddd it was way too hot. so we bought bus tickets instead. :)

the tomb of the unknowns.
definitely one of my favorite things in washington d.c. 

JFK is one of only two united states presidents buried in arlington. 

this is his headstone and the eternal flame. 

arlington was beautiful.
it was a quiet and peaceful day spent there. 

after hiking all over arlington, we. were. starving.
lizzie-beth heard of this really yummers place to eat in chinatown, so we met her there after she got off work.

uhhhh YUM. 

it was the cutest atmosphere, and had really great food. 

also, they have one in palm springs. hmm...

this is before they ate, that's why they look grouchy.

after dinner, we went back to Bolling AFB. jon and i had reserved a room at the Bolling Inn about a month before our trip out there. we had called the day before we left for DC, and then we called the day of to make sure our reservations were still good. honestly, we were both a little worried about it because their rooms went for $45 a night. that's pretty ridiculous, especially considering the prices of other hotels nearby. so something seemed fishy... they kept reassuring us, and telling us that our reservations were all set. well, when we got to the check in desk, the sassy lady at the front was 100% frazzled. the phone was ringing off the hook, and there was a line of people waiting to be helped.
to make a long story just a smidge shorter, they overbooked their rooms. meaning....we didn't have a place to stay that night. that wasn't going to fly, because we were leaving straight from there to pick up my dad and mei at the airport and bring them back to the room.
i guess you'll find out in the next post what happened........

however, 

this is how happy we are to all be reunited in washington!!

washington d.c. day...2.

when jon got home, we decided that we definitely wanted to go to washington d.c. i could not be more thrilled. jon was iffy about it-it doesn't really scream honeymoon. i knew he'd enjoy it though, and i thought it was important for not only him to see it, but for us to see it together, especially so soon after his return from afghanistan. 

it worked out beautifully:

lizzie got a summer job in D.C. we decided to go while she was out there. and hey, while we are there, why not invite the whole fam? my dad went to george washington university, and lived in dc for a few years. he knows all things washington, so we decided to coordinate so that we would all be there at the same time. jon and i were lucky enough to spend 9 whole days there. my dad and mei came out for a weekend we were there, and spent four of those days with us. it was so much fun. but, more on that later. 

our first FULL day there. first impression: SO HOT! coming from hardly humid and always breezy san diego, there was a very apparent climate change.

can i tell you a [not so] secret? i really like humidity. 

here we are at mount vernon. i went to take a photo of jon standing in from of that fence, and that HUGE snake was there instead! ick!!!!!

 the grounds were beautiful. 

i am oh so intrigued by washington. 

his home sits right on the potomac river. 

this is where the first president and his wife are buried.

 it was so awesome seeing jon put the wreath in the tomb. 

it was definitely a good start to the trip.

 purple heart memorial.

"The [purple heart] award was first given by General George Washington at Newburgh, New York on August 7, 1782 during the Revolutionary War to recognize distinction for meritorious action. The Purple Heart is currently awarded in the name of the President of the United States to members of the U.S. military who have been wounded or killed in action. According to the Military Order of the Purple Heart, an organization for combat-wounded veterans, the medal is “the oldest military decoration in the world in present use and the first award made available to a common soldier.”" link.

after seeing washington's home, we went to his distillery and gristmill. 

we met up with lizzie and ate dinner, then explored georgetown. 

 when i'm old and rich, this is where i'll reside. 

even if this idea is based on the font those house letters are in. 
and the color of the door.

 we stood in line for 45 minutes to get these. worth it.

here is jon at the swedish embassy!!! 

one day, he will work for a swedish embassy. 

or an american embassy in sweden. 

it will be done. oh yes. it will be done.

we made it. d.c. day 1 & 2.

 we had a layover in philadelphia. we went to the USO where they have volunteers taking care of our military. they have beds, tvs, chairs, food, etc etc etc, all free. loving people volunteer there. we stopped and got hot food. pork chops/hot dog, drinks. i got hot mac and cheese. it was really nice. 

 this is cutie-jon when we landed in DC. we love it here already!

 this is retro-jon on the metro. today, we spent our day at mount vernon where george washington lived. it was really cool. they have a ceremony every day at martha and george's gravesite. they asked for a veteran volunteer. jon was the only veteran there (my veteran, swoon), so he was selected. a little boy led us in the pledge of alegience, and then Jon put a wreath in between george and martha's headstones. they opened the gate for him and he walked INTO that little room and placed the wreath. then someone read Washington's Earnest Prayer. it was a really cool thing to see. then we went to see where washington's workers made whisky, om nomnom.

 after we learned about G.W., we went to pick up lizzie! we got to see where she works! and the cute little neighborhood she works in. we ate hotdogs and fried pickles, then took the metro/bus to georgetown and marveled at all the cute houses. then got some cupcakes, duh.

 that's my white slip showing through. not sure why they didn't sew a black slip in it? maybe it shows the lace better. just wanted to make that clear.
nevertheless, this is us on the metro. 

and this is what we found on one of the seats. a mormon passalong card. :)

house tour: family room.

thank you for all the sweet comments. coming home was such a fun experience. i watched our clip again, and i really liked it...again. it was such a special surprise for john, and i'm so glad that we have it permanently captured. 

well, i stopped doing the house tour!! no one commented on the posts that i put up, so i thought nobody cared to see our little home. my oldest sister asked me about it, and then hannah asked me about it. sooooo, for those two people, i'll continue on. ;)

when you walk in the front door and walk through a little hallway, you get to our family room. we decided to keep our spare bedroom as a sewing/guest room. so we put our 'office' in the family area. 

in this photo, the front door is on the right side. you can see a litttleee bit of the string of cards i have hung up:)

we got that alphabet right when we got married. its the swedish alphabet, so jon loves it. i'm not feeling it here anymore. we bought it before we had a color scheme or anything, so i feel like its just THERE. i'm frustrated with this whole area. it looks so cluttered. i think i'm going to take everything off of this wall and leave it blank for awhile. i'd like to get two shelves to hang above the desk to hold random objects and lean pictures on it. 

i still really like the alphabet and it's special to jon. good thing i found this photo and decided what i really want to do with that picture! hang it in our future baby's room! 

(in a few years!)

like so:

super cute, right? those swedes are amazing.

back to the office area. that desk is a million years old. or something like that. it was my dads a long, long time ago. then my sister took it to her townhouse when she got married. she'd had it in her new house's garage for at least a year by the time jon and i got married, and she was more than ready to let it go. so we brought it with us here. it is a nice desk. it has a file cabinet on the left side which is so nice for filing away school papers and receipts! 

the little green chair. i bought that at the DI for $8 before jon and i got married. i'm a sucker for designer chairs, or at least knock offs...

it was yellow when i got it, so i spray-painted it green to match the rug in front of the door. i had no idea where i was going with our front room until i bought that rug. i am using colors from the rug in the living area, its a slow process, but it's coming together.

i got that lovely printer off of walmart.com for $30. yep, you read that right. my sister and i follow all these blogs that tell you where the best deals are. i jumped on that one real quick. 

those speakers=jon's homecoming gift. he'd been obsessing over them since before we got married, so we decided to finally get them. they're pretty cool i guess.............................................they really come in handy saturday mornings when we are fight cleaning. we turn the music on really loud so we don't have to talk. haha.

(I read that line to jon and he said "We don't fight clean anymore!" and he is right. that is my disclaimer.)

i haven't been posting much. jon's dad and step mom were in town this weekend, and things got crazy. and, well, we've been busying ourselves with thoughts of this:

yes, we are going to washington d.c. i can NOT WAIT!! we've been planning and looking forward to this for months and months. planning is a term used loosely. we booked our hotel for tomorrow today...i feel like we need close parental guidance, and we aren't getting it. being married is funny.
we thought about going somewhere tropical for our honeymoon, but i thought washington was especially important right now. jon has never been before. i think that every american needs to go to there.
see you when we return! mmmm, maybe sooner if you're lucky. ;)