One of my favorite pictures

We're missing Will, but I love this picture of Steven and Mae taken after her graduation from 8th grade. Click on it to get the full impact of two happy faces. Sigh. It does a mother's heart good.

Washington, DC trip, part 2

So, continuing on with the 8th grade trip to DC, we spent some time in the Air and Space Museum. Recognize the Apollo? Amazing to think that was all the room they had in there. Click on the picture to check out the little cots they strapped themselves into.

These innnneresting water sculptures were outside. Lovely for the little kiddies to get their beginner's anatomy lessons.

We went to the Botanical Gardens. This was the only thing I wanted to take a picture of there. What a great idea for an arbor or walkway. I loved checking out all the varieties of plants in there. Otherwise, it was a bit ho-hum in comparison to Duke Gardens in Somerset, NJ, or the NY Botanical Gardens.

This was one of many, many benches Mae anointed with her bottom and her heavy sighs in DC. Actually this was the only pretty one. It would have been even better without the dividers in the bench. Mae discovered that if you don't place your bum correctly, you get a butt crack divider, ouch!

We did the Tour of Monuments from around 7 - 9 pm. Mae was definitely running out of steam and we visited every other bench along the walkways. She's standing in front of the WWII Monument (which is huge) and the Washington Monument is visible behind it. Mae is facing the Lincoln Memorial on the other side of the long Reflecting Pool (remember in Forrest Gump when he finished speaking just as the sound comes back on and Jenny wades into the water shouting, "Forrest!")

We walked through the Korean War Monument. The statues were all spaced out in kind of an elongated V to show, I guess, how they walked through an area. They all had capes over their uniforms, but you could see guns and radios and other things sticking out. The expressions were pretty grim. It was kind of depressing overall.

On our last day, we went to Arlington National Cemetary with a small detour into the Women's War Memorial. Here is Mae standing in front of the "Women Go To War" part of the women in WWII display. The class brought flowers to recognize her great, great aunt Allie B. Williams who was a WAC in WWII. We ditched the rest of the class and stayed here while they walked through Arlington. Mae couldn't see all the crosses to get the impact of how many there were, so we watched a movie about women in the armed forces through the years. Okay, I admit it, I sat with Mae on a bench... in an air-conditioned room while they had to walk through the cemetery in 85 degree humid heat. Heh, heh, heh.

On our way back to NJ, we stopped at the Naval Academy in Annapolis for lunch and a tour. Whoa! This is definitely something I'd recommend to others. Our tour guide was fantastic and as the former Director of Admissions for the Academy, he gave our group quite a bit of advice. One of the many things he said that stuck in my mind was that, on average, after college we live about 72 years. The amount of hard work we put into 4 years of high school and then 4 years of college - those 8 years - have a direct effect on how we get to spend those remaining 72 years.

This picture is of the residential dorms. I can't remember the name, but it has 8 connecting wings and is absolutely gorgeous inside and out. Big dorm rooms too.

The last thing we saw in Annapolis was the crypt of John Paul Jones. It's in its own circular room under the chapel. I wish we'd had more time to walk through here because he's quite the interesting historical figure in our history - "I have not yet begun to fight."

and a tiling masterpiece... ta da!

After the new stove and microwave got put in, we decided to FINALLY do something about putting up a backsplash of some sort. After measuring the space, I went shopping and found these 2" tiles that came in 12" sheets. We cut some of the sheets apart, but didn't need to do any tile cutting, they fit perfectly. Voila! It really was much easier than I expected. And yeah, the blue tape isn't there anymore :)

Before and after

Second to go, but first to be replaced was the oven. The cooktop just cracked out of the blue one day while Steven was cooking bacon. It would cost at least an arm to replace the part, so we decided to get a new one. Which meant a matching microwave, of course.

Before:

And after:

The first thing to go and just installed today were the lights. One of the globes of the island light just slipped out and shattered all over the kitchen. Steven and friends were making lunch at the time... notice the common denominator? Haha, really though, none of it was Steven's fault, but I got to rag on him anyway. The island light never matched the table light for some reason. It was one of those things that we said we'd take care of when we bought the house, but here it is 16 years later...

Before:

And after:

8th grade DC trip, Part 1

I went with Mae on the 8th grade field trip to Washington DC last week. It was a mostly fun trip except for the parts where Mae complained about walking. We arrived around noon on Tuesday and had a picnic lunch at Lafayette Park, which is just across from the White House. It was still drizzling so we ate standing up and walking around. The squirrels were very cute. At first. Look at this darling black one - he stood just a few feet from Mae. I threw him a piece of bread. Can we just say MISTAKE!

Every other squirrel in the park came out of the woodwork, or at least the trees. This guy was literally 2 feet from my face! I started getting nervous. I put the camera down and realized that we were surrounded by at least 30 of them, and they were stepping on my own feet. How I refrained from shrieking and running away, I don't know.

I pulled Mae along, listening to her complain that they were just friendly and they'd probably let her pet them. Sigh. She couldn't see the beady eyes that were gauging how far they'd have to climb up our legs to rip our food away. We walked to the other side of the park. I had no idea whose house this was, but there were demonstrators marching up and down protesting nuclear bombs or something. It took me a second to realize it's the White House. Yeah, THE White House. It's alot smaller in real life. There are houses in my town that are bigger, but then who needs all that room anyway. Ignore the chocolate on Mae's teeth. Pretend we are country bumpkins.

My most favorite place in DC will have to be the Library of Congress. Never mind all the historical and artistic treasures in its many collections, or the fact that every book ever published is here, the building itself was gorgeous. The tour guides were all welcoming and gracious. Mae was allowed to touch EVERYTHING. That was so cool, because it meant I could too! This was part of the ceiling in one of the rooms. All marble and each little square was less than a half inch. The designs were inspiring...

Even the floors were marble - doesn't this look like a quilt to be?

My next original quilt is going to be a medallion - here's my inspiration.

Even the ceilings were amazing. I took a bunch of pictures here but after looking at them on the computer I realized I concentrated on design elements that are probably boring to other people.

We went to the Capitol Building as well. I won't bother going there ever again. Snotty, unfriendly guides. I didn't see a single one there who smiled - at all - EXCEPT for the lady whose job was sitting inside the elevator. She was very nice; probably because she was lonely. It was really weird how they made a big deal about having to have a few people use their elevators. Hello! Never mind the girl with the cane, what about the kid in the wheelchair? How DO you expect him to manage the stairs?! Sigh. Mae wasn't allowed to touch anything in here. I felt like the pic I took outside was indicative of the inside. An armed guard to shoot you if you screw up and an ambulance to take you away immediately.

This was the only thing I took a picture of inside the Capitol Building. It was on the ceiling of course. If you click the picture to see it bigger, you may notice the lady in the center is George Washington in drag. I kid you not. My mind has forgotten the guide's explanation of the artist's intention, I was too mind boggled at my own thought that dang, those revolutionists were quite the swingers!