Day at the Washington Monument

Would you believe that we had two separate Scout events at the Washington Monument on Saturday?

Our day started off with a ride on the Metro. Any adventure that involves the Metro is a good one for our children. Not having to find parking in downtown DC is good thing for mom and dad. For our train obsessed toddler, seeing the Metro trains zoom in and out of the station was almost too good to be true. That we actually boarded one of these “choo-choos” was heavenly.

The Washington monument is about 3 blocks from the closest Metro station. Not bad for an adult or the one in the stroller, a little harder on the 6 year old who is prone to complaining anyway. Still, we made it to the base of the monument with 5 minutes to spare.

Our first event was a tour of the inside of the Washington Monument with Boo’s Cub Scout pack. They do have public tours, but it’s a hit or miss thing. You have to be inside the monument, looking through the windows and hear them announce a tour to get in on it. Or you can pre-arrange one for a group, like we did. Be warned though, this is not for the faint of knee. There are 897 steps inside, and we walked down every single one. So what’s the point of taking a tour down the stairs? Well for one, you can’t just walk down by yourself, you have to be escorted by a Park Ranger. Second, the inside is lined with memorial stones donated by all 50 states, many foreign countries and other private organizations. Some are very elaborate :

(from the Sultan of Turkey)

and some are very simple.

Actually, this one isn’t as simple as it appears. It is made of jade and is worth a 3 million dollars. It is the only memorial stone that you are allowed to touch. Because of vandalism like people carving their names into the stones or breaking off pieces of marble, you may not touch any of the other stones. Not even if you ask nicely.

My legs were getting a little quivery by the end of the tour, but I survived. This morning, though, my calves are quite sore.

By now the whole area was crawling with Girl Scouts arriving for the annual Sing-Along on the Mall. I was a little hesitant about attending this event. I don’t like crowds and I don’t like heat and humidity. I have about zero sense of adventure. But Pumpkin Girl wanted to go, plus this is Sing-Along was celebrating 95 years of Girl Scouts. And it was right here in Washington, DC. How could we pass up this opportunity? Plus, Pumpkin got a patch for her new Brownie uniform. And if you know any Girl Scouts, then you know it’s all about the patches!

We found ourselves a shady place to eat lunch. In the shade and with the wind, being outside was actually pleasant. Pumpkin got a chance to exchange swaps with the other Girl Scouts from around the country. I helped her choose a simple but cute little swap to make. I suspected that she would be hesitant to go up to girls and offer to swap, so we limited ourselves to making just 10 swaps. I thought that would be what she could handle and I didn’t want to end up with a whole bag of unused swaps. Turns out that other girls will happy to make the initial swap offer and we probably could have used another 10 or 20 more of our swaps. It was OK, though. Lots of the older girls offered her one of their swaps, even though she had run out of her own. I thought that really spoke well of the Girl Scouts as a group.

When the festivities got started we couldn’t hear from where we were sitting, so we moved out of the shade to be closer to the stage. We ended up sitting directly in front of the White House. I heard that they were expecting over 100,000 people that day. Seeing all the girls moving in groups toward the stage reminded me a little of Moses and the Exodus, without the unleavened bread and bitter herbs.

Boo and Phil were still in their Boy Scout uniforms from the earlier tour. They got a lot of notice and waves from the Girl Scouts. Boo, being at that age where he’s not really sure about the whole girl thing, didn’t know what to do with all the attention. Once when he waved back, he set the whole gaggle of Girl Scouts giggling (say that three times fast). I overheard one of the moms say “He’s one in a million here today.”

The sun was intense and we only lasted about an hour until we needed to go home. Pumpkin was ok with that, being quite tired and hot herself. She got her patch, did the swap thing and sang for an hour – it was a good day. We only made it halfway back to the Metro station before we needed to buy some ice cold liquid refreshments. I was getting a headache and by the time we got home, I was also feeling nauseated. Doesn’t Philip know better than to let me go outside during the summer? No matter how much water I drink, I’m destined to become a heat casualty. If God had wanted me to be outside, he wouldn’t have provided me with all this indoor air conditioned goodness.

I’m doing better today, but my legs need motrin!

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