Caissons & Cherry Blossoms

Usually I feel like the beginning of the year just creeps along - but the first quarter of 2024 has absolutely blazed by and I cannot believe that I am staring down the last week of March! The weather has been less than spring-like this week and over the weekend but sometimes you have to persevere in spite of the weather! And that's what we did this past weekend - persevered in spite of the weather!

I felt pretty crummy all day on Friday, so I whipped up some homemade chicken noodle soup on Friday night and we ended up laying pretty low for the evening, which was really nice. And on Saturday morning, we woke up to the promised deluge of rain - but never the less, we set out on our adventures!

Our first stop was a car dealership to peruse some options for Ryan - we even test drove cars in the crummy, chilly and rainy weather before making our way to the second stop of the day: The US Army Museum in Fort Belvoir. The museum opened on November 11, 2020 and is a pretty stunning exhibition on the history of the US Army. The museum has special significance for Ryan and I as his Dad was in the Army and served in Vietnam.

The museum is three stories - and while that might seem like a lot, the majority of the exhibits are on the first floor; although we did venture to all three floors just to be sure we didn't miss anything! We also watched the video in the theater that was incredibly moving and inspiring - the whole museum is a really wonderful experience and I highly recommend it!

The museum highlights the army from it's conception in 1775 (or earlier - depending) to modern day and so the Civil War was highlighted and I thought it was interesting that the two most decisive battles of the Civil War took place in Gettysburg, PA and Vicksburg, MS - since I'm a Mississippi girl married to a Pennsylvania boy, ha-ha!

The museum also has a cafe - which is where we had lunch - and the food was actually pretty decent! It's not a meal destination or anything, but I was pretty pleased with my Humvee Meal (which was a grilled cheese). Thankfully when we were done touring the museum, the rain had moved out and so we headed down to DC and made our way to the insanely crowded Tidal Basin area - to see the Cherry Blossoms, which are blooming at one of the earliest dates on record! 

It was crowded and more than just a little breezy - but it was so awesome to get to see the Tidal Basin ringed in those gorgeous white and pink blooms again! I haven't seen the cherry blossoms in person since 2020 (yikes) and Ryan has never seen them before. There were people everywhere and there were puddles everywhere - but I was just thrilled to be surrounded by the gorgeous trees again!

Thankfully the rain and wind hadn't caused the blooms to blow off and we were able to make our way from the MLK Jr. Memorial almost around to the Jefferson Memorial and really take in the blooms! Granted, we did have to dodge quite a few puddles to get from point A to point B - but we did just fine and no one fell into the Tidal Basin either, ha-ha!

The route we took led us right by the Tulip Library and while most of the flowers weren't quite yet in bloom, the ones that were opened looked absolutely lovely. I don't know if the Tulip Library will ever look quite as miraculous as it did the first year we discovered it - what with the perfect sunshine and blue skies - but the flowers never fail to disappoint, even when the weather is less than perfect. 

We'd planned to walk all the way around to the Jefferson Memorial but the wind was starting to pick up like crazy and so we ended up hopping into the car when my parents happened to crawl past us in the lines of traffic! After our brisk walk to see the blooms, we headed to another car dealership; this time in Arlington, to look at a prospective vehicle for Ryan and then headed for Chuy's for our dinner!

We closed out our day in DC with a stop at Trader Joe's and then headed home for a quiet evening. Sunday was sunny and beautiful, but very chilly and cold - so after church and taking my Dad out for an early birthday lunch - we spent most of the day indoors, admiring the sunshine from the warmth of the house! I sure can't wait for some warmer Spring temperatures to arrive and stick around! 

Flowers are in Bloom!

The first "official" day of Spring isn't until tomorrow but the past weekend was gloriously Spring-like and so we took advantage of the wonderful weather and tried to spend as much time outside as possible all weekend long! 

I had grand plans; after Friday being a gorgeous day all day long, of sitting out at the lake with Ryan to have our dinner and enjoy the gorgeous weather! We cooked a pizza and headed for the lake but the clouds had rolled in and the wind had picked up, so we ended up gobbling down our pizza and coming home pretty quickly to finish Masters of the Air and also watch an episode of Somebody Feed Phil before crashing for the evening! 

Ryan and I have been hoping to start hiking again every Saturday in March and finally - the third Saturday in March was an absolutely glorious day! So after Ryan returned from the Men's Bible Study, we packed our lunches and headed into the Shenandoah National Park for a huge chunk of the day. 

We decided to hike the Compton Peak Trail - and my navigation skills led us first up and down the Compton Peak Fire Road for a little over two miles before I realized we might be in the wrong spot. *face palm* Thank goodness it was a beautiful day! After returning to the car and eating our sandwiches, we headed out on the ACTUAL trail! 

Compton Peak is not a long trail - only 2.2 miles round trip - but be aware that the first mile is essentially all up, over rocks and switchbacks... but hey, once you've conquered that, the rest is flat or all downhill! The views from Compton Peak are gorgeous and we realized pretty quickly that we could see the Christendom College Cathedral from the peak - and beyond. 

Y'all know I can't not be goofy, so I had to get Ryan to take a picture of me pretending to "fall" off the side of the mountain, ha-ha! We stopped in at the Dickey Ridge Visitor Center before heading home to get clean and chill some and then grill burgers for dinner. We watched John Wick 4 to end the night and I slept like the dead after almost five miles of hiking! 

Sunday was another gorgeous day and after church, Ryan and I popped over to the Arboretum to see what it was looking like. Alas, Spring is still on it's way and not much was in bloom quite yet. We will have to make a return trip in the coming weekends! I spent a huge chunk of the afternoon soaking up the sun on the back deck and reading - and had Mission BBQ for dinner! It was a wonderful weekend!

And because I cannot resist sharing cuteness whenever I see it - my younger sister has been doing some training for work and while she was in her classes, a roommate stumbled upon a sweet pup that had been abandoned on the side of the road, so she brought her home! Have you ever seen anything quite so cute as this little lady?

The last report was that the little lady was going to be adopted - so her story will have a happy ending. And she was certainly spoiled for the 48 hours she was living with the girls in their crash pad! Okay - that's all I've got for today, please enjoy the pictures of flowers and the puppy!