24 Hour Visit with Nana

My mom was in Washington DC for an educator's conference, so John and I decided at the last minute to head down there to see her. We left Monday afternoon and arrived around 6:30 PM. We made really good time, managed to miss most traffic, and the girls did great! We were all excited to see Nana!

Her conference was held at the new Gaylord National Resort and Conference Center and it was incredible! What a place!


Here is my amateur shot of the hotel, but you should check out their website to see just how amazing it really is ... I felt like I was in a fancy hotel in Las Vegas! The Gaylord National is only part of a huge development right on the Potomac on the Maryland side called National Harbor. There are hotels, restaurants, shops and other attractions, including Cirque du Soleil. It's not completed yet, but once it is, it will be an incredible village with just about everything you could possibly want!

The rooms have double doors that open up to the big atrium. I took the above picture from our 11th floor room.

Here's Reagan and John in the room ... I'm not sure if all the hanging lights are there year-round, or if they are only there now as Christmas decorations. Either way, they are pretty spectacular!

John and Avery - on our way to dinner

This enormous tree was made of glass and it was suspended in the air!

Just as we were finishing dinner at 9:00 PM, the fountain by the tree went off. It was synchronized to music and the lights made the water change colors (a smaller version of the Bellagio in Vegas!). Reagan was mesmerized ... to be honest, we were all pretty impressed!

She kept holding her arm out, feeling the mist from the fountain ... it was splashing everywhere, soaking the stone in front of it.

Reagan's new thing is taking pictures ... I'm constantly finding my camera in her hands, with very interesting shots on the memory card! After snapping multiple shots of her, she insisted on taking one of me in front of the fountain. I had it set on the "night snapshot" setting, so you can see she didn't hold it very still when she took it!

What a precious look on her face :)

Here's a video clip of the end of the water show

Avery discovered puddles after the water show! She was soaked by the end, but she was so happy!

Tuesday morning: Avery went to bed very late (11:00 PM!), due to the close quarters, then she woke up at 7 AM. By 11:00, she was ready for a nap, so I put her down, then took Reagan back downstairs to the fountain.

Walking along the wall of poinsettias

Nana and Reagan

Reagan and Mama

Reagan and Papa - Gorgeous, festive decorations in the lobby

This was a large sculpture of King Triton coming out of the sand - a pretty impressive work of art. The enormous tree was also pretty spectacular.

Here we are on the pier, waiting to board the water taxi

Avery and Papa on the water taxi

Reagan and Nana on the water taxi

The water taxi went up and across the Potomac ... we went under the Woodrow Wilson Bridge

The water taxi dropped us off in Old Town Alexandria, Virginia, which is so full of history and character.

Here we are, walking down King Street, in search of a restaurant to have a nice late lunch/early dinner.

We decided on this restaurant called "Two Nineteen"

Reagan and Nana ... Both Reagan and Avery behaved very well, as we sat there having a lovely meal and catching up with my mom.

Avery was giving Reagan "loves" ... she's such an affectionate little thing, so I just love watching her give her big sister hugs!

It's pretty obvious that she adores her big sister!

Walking down King Street after lunch

Reagan and Mama

When we got back to the pier, we had about 30 minutes to kill before the water taxi took us back to the hotel ... there were so many seagulls, that I decided to take out some cheerios from the diaper bag.

Reagan loved every minute of this! The seagulls went nuts over the cheerios and we couldn't believe how close they would come to us to retrieve them!

We were lucky to have very mild weather, about 45 degrees

Reagan and Papa at the marina

I just love this picture of Reagan and her Papa having fun!

I took this picture of the hotel as we got off the water taxi ... it was just after 5:00 on Tuesday evening

We went back to the hotel room, packed up all our stuff, put the girls in their pajamas and packed up the car for the ride home.

By the time we got in the car, it was 6:30, so we spent exactly 24 hours there! It was sad to say goodbye to my mom, but I'm so happy we had the opportunity to spend some time with her. The hardest part about living so far from my parents is that I don't get to share my girls with them on a daily basis. I love my daughters so much and my favorite thing to do is show them off. My parents take their roles as grandparents very seriously ~ they truly adore their grandkids which makes me very happy. By the way Dad, Reagan was a little confused and concerned that you weren't there too! She definitely missed you!