Last Activities in DC

(really delayed post)

It was a fun, but unique first Halloween for Brigham. It was really fun for him to be around cousins, but it was unique because a lot of DC is apartments, so....trick or treating....isn't done in door to door neighborhoods. So, the local mall is set up as a trick or treating headquarters. All the shops can decorate and provide candy for the kids. It is really fun actually because you get to see hundreds of kids dressed up in a short amount of time. This is sleeping Brigham and his cousins trick or treating in the mall:

  Oh, I was also super glad to have family close by to celebrate with on Halloween because Adam had class until 10pm, so we just 'dressed up' with him later for a ward party.

Oops, I also forgot to mention that we didn't even have power on Halloween in our neighborhood because of Hurricane Sandy. ha. so it was a great thing we could go to the mall.

Speaking of, here are some pics of Brigham and I toughing out the storm and no power while Adam went up to NY with his brother-in-law and sister to help with relief. Really rewarding.

Turns out Brigham LOVES fire.

Anyway, some great food places we enjoyed trying were Good Stuff Eatery (amazing, but no pic), Ray's Hell Burgers (where Brigham tried his first shake),

and Ben's Chili Bowl (where Brigham sat in the same spot Obama sat at when he ate here. Also, Bill Cosby ate here so much they named the main dish after him).

and The Fish Market. One of our last nights in DC we just wanted to get out of the house and drive around. It was beautiful to see the city at night....but we took a couple accidental turns and found a hidden (but popular) fish market. Oh, so good! All the fish is caught in the tidal basin and Potomac right behind the wharf.

Our last outing in the National Mall was to the Natural History Museum and the Hirshhorn Modern Art Museum. The best picture we got at the Natural History Museum was us standing by a mummy, which I loved because it reminded me of seeing the tombs and mummies in Egypt, but it may be kinda gross for a blog. 

Now, the Modern Art Museum was super cool! I love modern art (and so does Adam) so we were really excited to go. They were featuring works of Ai Weiwei - the Chinese contemporary artist/political activist who openly criticizes the Chinese government through various art forms. Adam was really excited to see some of his artworks. You can see in this picture how he purchased 2,000+ yr old urns from the Han Dynasty and trivially painted over them and smashed them. 

Another one of his symbolic pieces:

This was just another one of our favorite pieces that shows the phases of the moon.

The last thing we did in DC was visit Adam's sister at her work downtown to get a tour and go to lunch. She works at the offices at the Williard Hotel. It is gorgeous and has a beautiful view of downtown.

 She works directly across the street from the White House. So, after lunch we took the time to go see the White House.

 And meet the famous White House neighbor. (if you want to know more you should look up the permanent protestor online).