Our DC trip Part 5

This day was July 4th.  We have never been in Washington Dc on the 4th of July~ we had no clue the journey we were about to embark on.

The metro wasn't bad at all.  We had a smooth ride to our stop.  We walked over to the The Bureau of Engraving and Printing, only to be greeted by yellow police tape and a small note taped to the door explaining that they were closed due to the 4th of July holiday.  That would have been nice to put on their website but no biggie.

We had other plans also.  So, we walked to the National Archives.  The closer we got to The National Archives the more people we saw.  We  had no clue that a parade was about to come down the street.  We missed most of it as we were standing in the longest line I had seen in DC so far.

Here is what we saw while waiting in line~ I am standing on a wall to take this picture:

In front of us

Behind us

 I have never seen this amount of people in DC before.  Thankfully, we have packed our lunch the night before and ate our lunch while standing in the 2 hr line in the hot hot sun.

But the wait was so worth it.  We got to see the original Declaration of Independence, the original Bill of Rights and the original Constitution.  The guards were impressed that little Michael at 2 yrs old, told them that was the Constitution- so proud.  Unfortunately, we were unable to take pictures.

I highly recommend the next time you are in Washington DC to stop by the National Archives- just don't go on the 4th of July unless you like waiting in a super long line.

We left The National Archives and went back to our hotel and got ready for our next adventure.  We packed up the van and drove to my dad's house and packed up all my Scentsy stuff I had left there.  I didn't want to leave all my Scentsy stuff at the hotel.  A good friend of my family invited us to their 4th of July cook out and wanted to have a Scentsy party also. It was great seeing Dave and Cheryl and catching up.  They had bought some very cool fireworks.  We found out that little Michael is not fond of the noise of fireworks and wanted to go back to the hotel.

We left there and drove back to my dad's to drop all my Scentsy stuff off and to drive back to the hotel, where we settled in our air conditioned room for the night.  Ahhhhh- air is good:)

Come back tomorrow to see where our travels took us.

In case you missed the beginning:
Home Sweet Home
Dc Trip Part 1
Our DC Trip Part 2
Our DC Trip Part 3
Our DC Trip Part 4

Our DC trip Part 4

On our 4th day in DC, we wanted to finish up the American History Museum and go to the Butterfly garden in the Natural History Museum, which just happened to be free on Tuesday:)

Everyday while in Washington Dc, we packed our lunch at the hotel the night before and found a nice shady, grassy area to eat.  Little did we know about our lunch visitors, which made it really hard for the little ones to sit and actually eat.

Here are some pictures of our adventures on this day:

 The Butterfly Garden at the Natural History Museum:

We had a blast and are enjoying our trip to DC.

Come back tomorrow to see what our plans were for the 4th of July:)

In case you missed the beginning:
Home Sweet Home
Dc Trip Part 1
Our DC Trip Part 2
OUr DC Trip Part 3

My Shopping Day~ 07/16/2012

Yesterday, I was a mama on a mission.  Yesterday, was Nathan's birthday and I was running around like a chicken with my head cut off.

Luckily, we attended the Lowe's Build and Grow event in our area on Saturday and I knew that Kroger still had milk on sale.  Since, we were in the area we decided to pop into Kroger and Martin's on Saturday.  That helped lighten our load yesterday.

Here are the details to our shopping trips:

07/14/2012
Kroger
$9.52- (4) gallons skim milk
$2.76- (4) dz eggs marked down to $0.69
$2.49- Chocolate PB cereal
$15.18 Total after tax

Martins
$0.54- Mark down bread

07/16/2012
Dollar Tree
$1.00- Dish detergent
$1.00- Toilet cleaner
$1.00- Flowers
$1.00- Cold Stone Jelly Belly jelly beans- special treat for hubby
$4.18- Total after tax

Kroger
$0.99- Birthday candles
$2.49- Chocolate PB cereal for special yummy project
$5.49- Whole Chicken
$9.22- Total after tax

Martins
$0.54- Reduced bread
$0.84- Reduced Honey Wheat bread
$1.38- Total after tax

Walmart
$0.98- Frozen green beans
$1.98- Frozen corn
$1.98- Frozen peas
$0.98- Frozen green beans
$0.98- Frozen green beans
$2.32- Lunchmeat
$4.00- Pizza cheese
$1.17- Bananas
$1.48- Sour Cream
$0.78- Brown rice
$0.98- Vanilla
$2.28- PB
$1.68- Grape Jam
$0.98- Tortilla Chips
$4.14- Yeast
$3.24- Quick Oats
$2.68- Apple Juice
$33.32- Total after tax

This shopping trip has been added to our July Monthly Spending post, where I keep track of what we spend for the month of July.

Menu Plan for the week of 07/26/2012

Yesterday was a wild and crazy day.  It was Nathan's birthday.  I cannot get over how fast time is flying.  It seems when you are young, time seems to go by so slowly and when you are older, time seems to fly by.  There never seems to be enough hours in the day.

All our boys are growing so fast.  Nathan turned the big 08 yesterday.  He is so excited to be able to get out of his booster seat.  Along with it being Nathan's birthday, I had to go grocery shopping plus Nathan had a dentist appointment yesterday afternoon.  Needless to say, I was running around yesterday trying to get every thing done.  I actually had forgot about Nathan's dentist appointment and had this crazy idea that I would get a chance to bake his super special birthday cupcakes yesterday.  Well, that didn't happen- I didn't even make dinner yesterday.  Thankfully, we used our Papa John's gift cards and points to get 4 large pizza's for $14.90.  Plus, we still have pizza leftover- guess what's for dinner tonight- LOL:)

Today, I need to get busy and bake Nathan's birthday cupcakes as well as some other things around the house that need to get done, plus packing.  We are heading down the see my inlaws this week and celebrating Nathan's birthday again.

Here is our short menu plan for this week:

Breakfast
Strawberry Bread X2
Chocolate Chip pancakes
Oatmeal with honey and raisins

Lunch
Sandwich, carrot sticks and banana

Dinner
Pizza for Nathan's bday
Leftover Pizza and other leftovers to clean out fridge before we leave
Chocolate Chip pancakes
Dinner with inlaws Thursday - Saturday

Snacks
Apple Slices
Celery with PB and raisins- Ants on a log:)
Popcorn
Carrot Sticks

What do you have on your menu plan for this week?

Homemade Syrup

What good is making pancakes if you don't have super yummy syrup?  We love this recipe- it is super easy to make.  I usually make it while I am cooking the pancakes.  When we are done eating our pancakes, I store the leftover syrup in a quart size canning jar in the refrigerator for next time.

Warm Homemade Syrup

1 3/4 C Sugar
1/4 C Brown Sugar
1 C Water
1/2 tsp vanilla
1/2 tsp maple flavoring
1/2 tsp butter flavoring

Combine sugars and water in pan on stove.  Heat until boiling.  Cover and let boil for 1 minute.  Cool for 10 minutes and add vanilla, maple and butter flavorings.  Stir and enjoy this warm, delicious, yummy pancake syrup.  For our size family, we double the this recipe so that we have leftover syrup for future pancakes, waffles, french toast, etc.

Our family's favorite pancake recipe

Here is our family's favorite pancake recipe:

4 C Flour- we use White Whole Wheat Flour but you can use any flour you have on hand
6 tsp baking powder
2 tsp salt
4 Tbsp sugar
2 eggs
4 C milk
6 Tbsp oil

Combine all ingredients in bowl.  Mix well.  Cook on griddle and enjoy:)  Sometimes for a special yummy treat we add in 1 C chocolate chips.

I also want to let you know that I use this recipe for our family of 6 with leftovers for breakfast the next morning.

These pancakes taste heavenly with our homemade syrup:)

Our DC trip Part 3

Day 3 for us was on Monday.  We have power, we have air, we have working hair dryers and most importantly we have hot coffee:)  We were starting off on good vibes.

We decided to go to the American History Museum today.  We got on the free shuttle with the most awesome shuttle driver ever, Justus.  I wish I could have gotten a picture of him with little Michael.  Justus was so sweet and made friends with little Michael.  If you asked little Michael, who we were going to see today, he would answer you and it was the same answer everyday we asked~ "I'm going to see my friend Justus."  It was so sweet.

We hopped on the shuttle to the metro. 

There was so much to do at the American History Museum, we couldn't fit it all into 1 day.  We did as much as we could. 

Here are some highlights from that day:

Dorothy's Red Slippers

Scarecrow hat and boots

1600's guitars

Nathan as President of the United States:)

Really cool looking chess set

We had lots of fun exploring the museum.  Learned lots of cool things~ like did you know that in the original Wizard of Oz, Dorothy's Slippers were not red? 

Come back tomorrow to see where we went the next day.

In case you missed the beginning:

Home Sweet Home

DC trip Part 1

Our DC Trip Part 2