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!
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