McLean Adventures

We all adore hanging out in McLean with Mimi and Grumpa! Especially now that Grumpa is an experienced chocolatier. He makes his own keto chocolate that I think are actually delicious, especially when he mixes in mint and orange flavorings. 

Making flavored chocolates in the emoji molds and some chocolate strawberries

Annie was VERY on board with this activity

A truly delicious activity. 10/10, would eat keto chocolate again.

Action shot of Isaac the ball boy

The kids were big fans of Clemyjontri park

And then it was New Years Eve! Of course we had the traditional chinese takeout, movie marathon, pina coladas, and confetti poppers. We watched the Lego Movie with the kids, did a round of poppers at our fake midnight, then put them to bed, and watched some more movies until midnight. 

SIDE NOTE: Aaron randomly chipped his tooth on his fork while eating chinese takeout. Luckily, his dentist in Sahuarita was able to fix it easy-peezy when we got back.

Isaac Blood, Lord of Confetti Land

Elliot and Annie both talked me into bringing a bag of confetti home for "crafts."

We took the kids (minus Isaac who was still a bit sick) to visit my Grammie and Papa! They worked their hardest to stuff us full of an inordinate amount of sugar while we were there. I've been calling them every Sunday for a few years now, and it is fun to be able to visit in person. 

I found this gem in Grammy and Papa's house. It is my handwriting, so I think I put this little book together for them for a christmas present about 15 years ago. 

We got the jacuzzi bath working! 

The kids ended up making two trips to the national zoo! Most of the Bloods were staying with Megan in Maryland. We were all going to go to the zoo together, but they ended up having a Covid scare. It was a false alarm, so they went the day after we went with my Mom. Aaron took Elliot and Annie for zoo round 2 on the metro which was a huge win- they thought the metro train and the super long elevator leading to it was awesome. 

The panda was everyone's favorite! Except for Stephen. His favorite was the bamboo. 

A close second was the tiger. He was making this super deep growl that you could hear from super far away. The other big favorite was the komodo dragon, but it was hard to get a picture of it through the glass. 

Mimi is very good at getting the kids engaged and excited at the zoo. She took better pictures of the animals so that they could look at them more afterwards. 

We met up with some Bloods at the national gallary of Art and the Portrait Gallery. I felt a little bit like we spent most of our time looking for each other as people continually wandered off, but it was still nice looking at all the exhibits. My favorite was The Throne of the Third Heaven of the Nations' Millinnium General Assembly. It was made entirely out of cardboard and tin foil by this guy in the 50's after having religious visions. The detail on these things were crazy. 

For Morgans birthday, we went to see West Side Story in theatres and then went out to eat with her family at a place called Founding Farmers. It was so delicious that I took Aaron back to eat there for our anniversary a few days later (he had more than willingly skipped the musical to stay home with the kids). It was delicious, and it's always nice to get out with my favorite Aaron!