Trip to Virginia

We're back! We drove out to Virginia last week for Paul's brother's wedding, and took a little extra time off to visit our old stomping grounds. We had a wonderful time, and have a lot of great pictures to show for it. Although I'm still baffled as to how I never got a decent picture of the bride and groom, or any of our day with my parents and Bryan and Jeni and their kids. Whatever. We'll just use our imaginations. :)  

The first few days we spent with Paul's brother's family near DC. Here's Peter at Cox's Farms. We went there on Halloween, with Alexandra and two of her boys. 

Lunch at Cox's. Peter, me, Will, (Porter in the stroller), Alexandra and Benjamin,

More Cox's...

Cousin bath time! There are FIVE boys in there! Nora didn't join them, which was probably for the best.

Porter is such a sweet, affectionate little guy. He gives kisses on demand, and Nora was always willing to offer a cheek.

Trick-or-treating! There's Brigham with Porter the dragonfly, Benjamin the ninja, WIll and Andrew the soldiers, Peter the Robin, and Nora the duck. It was a chilly night, so everyone had lots of layers underneath. 

Nora at the Natural History Smithsonian.

The Air and Space Museum was a favorite. The space ice cream remains one of the big things they still talk about from the trip.

Benjamin touching the moon rock.

We both love the Air and Space Museum and have lots of great childhood memories from there.

There's the Capitol building.

And the Washington Monument.

After our DC adventures, we drove south a little ways to visit my brother Bryan and his family. They live right near the Chesapeake Bay, so Bryan is now a certified sailor. It was a perfect afternoon for him to take us out on one of the Air Force's little sail boats. We watched the fighter jets and stealth planes fly overhead along withe the seagulls and pelicans. It was a really fun adventure.

And it of course made Paul feel all sorts of manly, manning those sails. :)

The rest of the time was in Richmond with Paul's entire family for Mike and Kat's wedding. The time together felt too short, but we had some great times. We all really loved getting to know Kat and her family and friends better. It was a really nice wedding.

Katie brought her boyfriend Eric along too, so we finally got a chance to get to know him a little better. 

It's sad but this is the best shot I got of the beautiful bride, with little Nora looking on.  I guess weddings are totally different once you have three little kids to keep track of.

Benjamin getting chummy with his fellow red-headed Aunt Katie at the reception. He told me today that if things don't work out between Katie and Eric, then he (Benjamin) will marry Katie.  

Here's one of Kat dancing with her father, and Mike dancing with his mother.  There was lots of good music and good dancing, especially by the kids.

It was a great trip. And the drive wasn't even that bad for being 13-16 hours. Nora pretty much watched our one Yo Gabba Gabba DVD on repeat the entire time, and the boys just did their own thing in the back. I think we may have gotten this crazy long car trip thing down!