Mendez Musings: September "U.S." Mendez Update!

Here is story of our month in August - in pictures!

First, say goodbye to our stuff. See ya' on the flipside! (Hopefully not flipped over and destroyed all that.)

And how does the Mendez clan celebrate packout being over? By going to ChuckeeCheese of course!

Here is the last day of preschool for Lily in Chile. (Unfortunately, I didn't get any pictures of Abby's.)

Our Chilean neighbor threw a farewell party for Abby for all the neighborhood kids. One of the nicest gestures ever done for us in Chile. I about bawled right there. The kids had a wonderful time.

And here we are: IN THE US!!!!!

Here is Abby and Lily as we are dealing with clearing customs in Atlanta.

And here we are in the airplane on the way to DC!

So this begins Part 1 of our DC adventure!

Our first field trip was to the American History Museum. Ever since Abby told us "her" flag was the Chilean flag, I have been adamant that she learn about the US Flag. So we went to the "Star Spangled Banner" exhibit, where you can see THE Star Spangled Banner. It was C-O-O-L.

They wouldn't let us take pictures inside, so here we are outside the exhibit.

Drawing pictures of the flag we just saw.

Watching an interactive skit about the making of the flag. Basically she is showing you how long one of the stripes in the flag was. I think it was forty feet long or something like that.

And here we are afterwards, on our way back to the Metro. Did I mention we did all this in pouring rain??? Thankfully it cleared up just enough for us to get from the museum back to the Metro.

We also went to Build-A-Bear one evening with Daddy. Joel was able to record his voice on a machine put inside the bear, so when they squeeze the arm, he can talk to them. We purposely did this so the girls would have this when he was away at training, and then later gone to Afghanistan.

The rest of the month was a constant, frantic attempt to keep the girls occupied and entertained. The hotel gave us guest passes to the Gold's gym across the street - which had a free childcare/play area. So we spent a lot of time there. There was a play cafe in Reston that had a supervised play area as well, so when I needed to work we would go over to the Play Cafe so I could get stuff done. (I also had to finish up the certification course I was taking while we were there.) The hotel also had an indoor pool, so Joel and I would take the girls in the pool often as well.

And we went all over trying to find the coolest playgrounds. Here is Turtle Park, which was cute.

But our BIGGEST fun was our trip to Sesame Place. I think this is on my "Places I Must Go Before I Die" list. Especially since I got re-addicted to it watching it with Abby.

Notice the "We Speak Spanish" sign in the window.

And Abby is knocking on the door at 123 Sesame Street, looking for Elmo. She wanted him to come out and play.

I told the girls that Elmo was still sleeping, so Lily is telling us to hush.

Lily's favorite character there was Big Bird. She in fact said "Bird" and we didn't understand her, so she started signing it.

We didn't do many character meals, just the bedtime snack with Cookie Monster and Abby Caddaby. And since my favorite character EVER was Cookie Monster (who eats all the cookies he wants and never gains an ounce) was there, I almost keeled over getting to meet him. My inner preschooler was just in shock. And my little preschooler children were quite in shock too!