Mr Beazley's pool

The most exciting part of Election day 2010 (for the girls, anyway) was getting to swim in Kim Beazley's pool. We arrived at his residence, which is beautiful, just before 8 am. They had breakfast set up in one room and then there was live coverage of the results in another room, with huge TVs broadcasting the ABC coverage. Pia and Ella wanted to spend as little time in that room as possible and they soon headed out for the pool, dragging James with them. Afterwards, they and some other kids had a great time running around in the front garden, amongst trees planted by George Bush and Kevin Rudd.

James and the girls outside the Ambassador's residence.

On our way home we stopped off at the National Cathedral, which is beautiful. Inside, the stained-glass windows are amazing, and the rose windows are very similar to Notre Dame. In the surrounding gardens, the girls saw their first black squirrel. We had been told they were quite rare, so they were very excited to actually see one.

The National Cathedral

Earlier in the week, in went to the National Building Museum and saw the Lego Architecture exhibition. Architect Adam Reed Tucker has created 15 models of famous buildings and skyscrapers, all made out of Lego, of course. Afterwards the girls got to try their hand at creating their own buildings. Ella and James worked together on one house, while Pia made a squirrel's house(no surprises there!) Their Lego creations were then added to a Lego community made up of the buildings created by other children who had visited the exhibition.

The Empire State Building

Pia and Ella work on their own Lego creations

So that is the end of another week for us (they are going very quickly....) Until next time!

Annapolis, Archives and Tchaikovsky

Pia, Mistress Pat and Ella

Since last we wrote, we have been on several other excursions in and around Washington. Last weekend we went to Annapolis for the day. Annapolis is the state capital of Maryland and is about 45 minutes east of Washington DC, on Chesapeake Bay. It was established in the late 16th century and still retains much of its old world charm. We were lucky enough to be the only people on a walking tour of the town, which lasted for 2 1/2 hours. We were a bit concerned about how the girls would cope, but they managed just fine, sometimes walking as Pia and Ella, and sometimes scurrying around as squirrels. Our guide, Mistress Pat, dressed in her 16th century outfit, took us through many of the sights of Annapolis. The layout of the town is based around 2 big circles, one with a church it in, the other with the State House. All the streets are then linked to these 2 circles.

We saw the State House, with its domed roof, upon which sits an enormous acorn, much to the girls delight. The State House is very impressive and is still in use today. It was here that George Washington resigned his commission as Commander in Chief of the Continental Army and the girls stood on the same spot from which he did this.

Annapolis is also the home of the US Naval Academy. There we saw the crypt of John Paul Jones ( an American Naval hero) which reminded us a lot of the tomb of Napoleon in Les Invalides in Paris. We later found out that Jones' crypt had in fact been based on Napoleon's. The weekend we were there was the first weekend that the new intakes of the Naval Academy were allowed out with their parents, so there were plenty of crisp, white uniforms walking around the town as well.

On Monday, James took the girls to the National Archives to see the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. At first they were a little puzzled as to why they were being taken to see a few bits of paper, but they ended up having a great time in the Kids Learning Center. There, they did puzzles of George Washington, word searches and coloured in replicas of the murals that line the walls of the Rotunda. Their favourite was the one with George Washington in it. He seems to have captured their imagination and Ella now walks around saying, "He is a hero in my heart."!! Now, they have their own copies of the Declaration of Independence for their scrapbooks.

Yesterday, the girls and I went back to the Natural History Museum, where we saw the Bold and the Beautiful! The bold was the enormous orange knee tarantula. Her name was Miss Juliette and we were there for her feeding time. Yesterday, her diet consisted of a live cricket. She appeared to be asleep in the corner of her cage, but once the cricket was dropped in and started hopping around, quick as a flash, she pounced on it and held it to her mouth while she injected venom into it. This process takes hours apparently, so we did not hang around to see it actually being eaten! We then moved on to the Beautiful - the butterfly enclosure. Here, we were surrounded by hundreds of the most beautiful butterflies that flew all around you. We watched them eat the cut up fruit that was laid out and were able to get close enough to see their straw-like tongues uncurl as they drank nectar from the flowers. It definitely made a nice change from watching Miss Juliette eat!

Finally, last night we went to a concert held at the foot of the Washington Monument.

The US Army Band was playing Tchaikovsky's 1812 Overture, complete with cannons from the US Army (the girls did find the cannons a bit scary!) The 1812 Overture was the finale, so before that they played tunes from Superman, Disney movies as well as many US military songs. James thought it was a fine display of American Patriotism!And as the evening went on, the backdrop of the Washington Monument became more and more stunning. It was a gorgeous evening.

The US Army band

We are looking forward to Saturday when we have been invited to an election day breakfast at the Australian Ambassador's residence. Hopefully this will provide some excitement to what seems to have been an otherwise boring election campaign! We 'll let you know how the breakfast goes....

Visit to Mt Vernon

The highlight of the weekend was our visit to Mt Vernon, home and final resting place of George Washington, the first president of the United States. The girls were quite intrigued by his elegant and refined home - as much by the lurid colours of some of the rooms (one was Canberra raiders green) as by the key to the Bastille which was on prominent display - a gift to Washington from the Marquis De Lafayette. The whole experience, of course, was awash in American national mythology - the girls sat through an 18 minute introductory film which showed Washington's leadership in the French/Indian war and then his famous crossing of the Delaware to surprise the English and their Hessian (German) recruits. Pia enjoyed most of all the scene in the film where Washington fell in love with Martha (more later on that) and when he returned home to the warm embrace of the children. Ella was not frightened by the sound of musket shots and the admittedly quite bloodthirsty scenes of battle. Both spent quite a bit of time in front of Washington's tomb,a place where Churchill, De Gaulle, Elizabeth 2 and other notables have paid their respects in the past. The night before we had read a kids version of Washington's life story: "Big George" so the girls were well prepared.

The girls were also interested in the idea of him as a father for the whole country - wow! That's a big daddy!! and they remembered his speech to his compatriots: 'We fight to be free'. And who was this other person called Cincinattus they wondered? After a visit to the mansion, which included an impressive study, complete with swivel chair (a true advance for the times) we looked around the rest of the estate - smokehouse, kitchen, orchard, veggie patch (enormous) laundry and sheep and cattle runs. In the veggie patch by the wharf Pia danced gaily through the fields trying to catch the crickets, but alas, much to her frustration, they proved elusive. From that field we took a nice, shaded walk through the forest trail back to the lunch.

Just before going in to lunch, however, (we had brought our own, since one cannot rely on American restaurants to have decent gluten free options) we noticed quite a sizeable and impressive painting of Washington on his knees, horse nearby, reciting the famous prayer for his country. My own contemplation of this artwork was interrupted by a nearby American tourist who bellowed: 'Aw heck I ain't going to do no more readin': Ah just wanna bowl of shrimp'. But in the cafeteria - the usual American theme-park cesspit of junk and culinary catastrophe - there was no shrimp: just loads of pizza and loads of truly criminal looking nachos.

Triumph, however, came in the gift shop for the girls - they found toy squirrels, and promptly called them George and Martha. Pia has now written a very cute little story about their adventure at Mt Vernon. Another 40 degree plus day however meant that we were all pooped by day's end. Next stop - Jefferson's Monticello, although this weekend we are hoping to get to nearby Annapolis.

George Washington's Pioneer farm.

Earlier in the week we also visited the Library of Congress. The girls went to story time there and spent some time in the Young Readers Centre, where you can sit and look at all the kids books, but borrowing is not allowed. Then we had a look around the Great Hall, which is very ornate and impressive. We had been wrongly told that there were images of squirrels on the ceiling so after much time spent looking for them we finally were told that no squirrels were on the walls or ceilings! We did find lizards though, so thank goodness for that!

The Great Hall inside the Library of Congress.

The girls have also been enjoying playing at the local parks and meeting American playmates. Ella has her technique for making new friends perfected. She goes up to whoever she would like to play with and says, "Hello, can I play with you? I am from Australia." Then she looks at them with her large eyes, and a sad and pleading expression on her face. So, how can anyone resist that! One little boy once tried to say no, but was quickly made to change his mind! Pia, on the other hand, loves chasing after squirrels, collecting acorns for them and trying to build them a home. The other day she said to me at the park, "Mummy, I've had the luckiest day today: I saw a hummingbird, a squirrel smiled at me, and I found 3 butterfly wings!" So that sums up Pia!

Pia's thoughts on today

Today we went to the Art Gallery and I made this sculpture of a squirrel.


Then we had lunch in the sculpture garden.


My favourite sculpture was the silver tree.


Ella's favourite was the cubby house.

The Mall

Hi everyone. This week we have spent quite a lot of time visiting the museums around the Mall. The Mall is this long, green rectangle of open space in the middle of Washington and many of the Smithsonian Museums are housed around it. The Capitol Building sits at one end and at the other is the Washington Monument, with the Lincoln Memorial behind that. We spent a bit of time in the Mall on Friday, having a snack and Pia enjoyed feeding the pigeons, and it had a nice, lively, summery atmosphere.

The girls have done some interesting things this week. On Tuesday, they went to a kids art talk at the National Gallery of Art. A guide gave a talk on one of the paintings (Interior of the Pantheon, Rome by Giovanni Paolo Panini) and then read a story. Finally, the children did an art activity, which in this case was decorating their own version of the Pantheon. Pia had hers covered in squirrels (these are now her favourite American animal, she says!)

On Wednesday, we headed back to the Natural History Museum, fast becoming one of the girls' favourite museums here. This time we saw the exhibition on gemstones and minerals, which included the Hope Diamond (the largest diamond in the world). We also saw some of the dinosaur exhibit, although this was huge so we will have to return to finish it another day.

I have been struck since we've been here at how much some parts of Washington remind me of Paris. The monuments and museums are so huge and much of the architecture reminds me of buildings you would see in Paris. I'll include a photo of one such area near L'Enfant Plaza in which the archways and cobblestone paths could be straight out of Paris!

On Friday, we went to the Ripley Discovery Theatre, which is just behind the Smithsonian Castle. The girls watched the Franzini Family Circus Show in which they learnt about such things as balance, circular motion, centrifugal force and air pressure! There was a magical science dog, clown and crazy professor who, of course, made it all fun. They also had a ride on the merry-go-round which is in the middle of the Mall.

The rest of the week we have spent at the local park, where the girls get to meet some American playmates,the local pool and hanging out at home. The weather has been a bit kinder this week, with not as much humidity, which has been a nice change. This afternoon, I am off to do a tour of the Eastern Market / Capitol Hill area.

James also wants me to report how much Pia has been enjoying learning about American Presidents, past and present. He has bought her several readers on Obama and Abraham Lincoln. Pia was not overly impressed at first, but she has actually enjoyed reading about their life stories and their journey to become President. The park just down the road, Lincoln Park, has a statue commemorating Lincoln's emancipation of the African-American slaves, so Pia gets reminded of this fact each day as we walk past. I'm sure by the time we return, she will have learnt about many more Presidents!