Jan and Bree fly to D.C. to spend Bree’s winter long weekend with Angela’s parents.
Jan flies in first and makes his way to the Chen’s condo in McLean. He arrives at the building to find them in conversation with the building receptions. Apparently there’s a bit of a snafu with a reservation the Chens made for one of the hotel-like rental units in the building, so Jan and Bree don’t have a place to stay. The decision is made to have Bree stay in the Chen’s guest room, and Jan will stay in the nearby Ritz-Carlton.
After they have dinner, Cheng-nan comes with Jan to meet Bree at the Metro station and bring her back.
Jan and Bree in D.C., Day 1. In preparation for our visit, E-moon has laid in a large supply of onion pancakes for Taiwanese dan bing, so that’s what we have for breakfast.
We walk to the station and take the Metro to George Washington University so we can visit their textile museum. The museum’s highly regarded but small, and unfortunately one of the two exhibit halls is closed to install a new exhibit. It doesn’t take long to explore the remaining hall, but it’s interesting. The best room shows the raw materials for various fibers – we knew that silk came from silkworm cocoons, but had never seen any firsthand before. There’s also a large oversized loom-like frame in which we try weaving a pattern with thick ropes.
We’re not far from the National Mall, so we walk over and look at the Lincoln Memorial and the Reflecting Pool. By now it’s lunchtime, and the nearest restaurant of interest is a place described as “Italian” not far away. We walk there and discover that it’s the hotel restaurant for the (in)famous Watergate Hotel.
After lunch we walk for a bit along the Potomac, then walk back to the station and ride back to McLean.
In the evening, we have fun trying out E-moon’s giant space pod massage chair. Periodically it pokes or jiggles some new area, causing Bree to laugh or shriek.
Jan and Bree in D.C., Day 2. After breakfast we head back into the city to visit some museums.
We start with the National Gallery of Art. Bree’s American Studies history teacher has made extensive use of historical paintings in his class, so we head to the wing of American paintings to see if Bree can recognize any of the works. The first one we find is “U.S. House Of Representatives” by Samuel Morse (who also created the telegraph). This is actually one of the paintings the class discussed when Angela and Jan visited for Parent’s Weekend, so Jan recognizes it too.
Bree recognizes a number of other paintings and artists and shares what she recalls about them from the class. Jan also sees one small painting by Winslow Homer called “Dad’s Coming!” that seems very familiar – a portion of the painting showing a boy sitting on the prow of a boat is the logo for Seattle’s Beechers cheese company.
As we’re leaving the American painting galleries, we see a small child running over to look through a grate in the wall. The child’s father scolds the kid saying, “That’s where they put the bad children.” We think this is a pretty weird thing to tell a kid.
We get lunch in the museum’s cafe, but Jan misunderstands what Bree wants to order and ends up ordering a strange, herb-covered flatbread. It’s not very good, so we split Jan’s French onion grilled cheese sandwich.
Leaving the National Gallery, we stop by the American Museum of Natural History to see if we can fulfill Evan’s request for a dinosaur plush toy. We have fun poking around the museum a bit, and especially enjoy a large exhibit showing animal skeletons. It’s quite hard to tell some animals – rabbits, for example – from their skeletons alone. We’re amazed at the tiny size of some of the small rodent and frog skeletons. We check out the museum gift shop, but sadly their dino selection is inferior.
We make one more stop at National Museum of the American Indian, and enjoy a beautiful exhibit of weavings by Navaho artist DY Begay.
Jan and Bree in D.C., Day 3. It’s a cold, sunny day, so Jan organizes an outing to nearby Great Falls National Park. Although the Virginia side of the park is only 15 minutes away, the Chens only ever visited the Maryland side, so the place is new to them.
The park’s waterfalls are a spectacle, roaring with a flood of brown water. We stop to look at the Potomac from various viewpoints, then make our way back to the park entrance.
We stop back at the condo for a bit, then head out for lunch. We’d noticed that McLean has a branch of the Santouka Ramen chain, and Bree’s eager to enjoy some familiar ramen. The waitress misunderstands Bree’s request for extra barbecued pork, and brings her a side dish of barbecued over rice instead. Bree is very happy with this accident.
After lunch we walk across the street to the Whole Foods so E-moon can pick out a couple of new orchids for her collection. We each hold an orchid on our walk back to the condo, hoping the jostling journey in the cold air won’t damage them.
In the late afternoon the four of us go to Tyson’s Corner so Bree can do some shopping with E-moon. Jan also helps E-moon negotiate some upgrades of her iPhone and iPad at the Apple store. We have dinner at Seasons 52, then make one more stop at the Lego store. Bree picks out a small Lego flower kit: a display of plum blossoms. E-moon owns an orchid she’s named “Bree”, so Bree tells E-moon she’ll name the plum blossoms “E-moon”.
Jan and Bree in D.C., Day 4. We want to visit a bookstore, and the closest independent bookstore seems to be Bards Alley bookstore in Vienna. We first stop at the nearby Caffe Amouri for hot drinks, then browse the bookstore for a while.
We have lunch back at the condo – Cheng-nan was excited to cook for us, so he’s made curry rice. During lunch we keep an eye on the weather outside. A snowstorm is expected this afternoon, so we’re hoping it doesn’t interfere with our flights back to Hartford and Seattle.
Before leaving the condo, E-moon gives Bree some frozen food to take back to school: bah-tzang rice balls and cha chiang mein noodle sauce. We say our goodbyes and then head to the airport. We’re happy that, although TSA pulls aside Bree’s bag to check out the frozen food, they don’t seem to care about it, so she can happily return to school with a couple of home-cooked meals.
Mojo would prefer that he be left in peace to continue his nap on top of the loft bookshelf.
To celebrate Angela’s birthday, Jan organizes a dinner party at The Herbfarm restaurant in Woodinville. It’s been ages since we ate there.
Jan invites four of Angela’s friends and their husbands, and everyone does a great job keeping quiet about the dinner party. Brent went skiing with Angela yesterday and doesn’t let the party slip, nor does Anna when she goes on a previously-scheduled walk with Angela this afternoon. Angela is duly surprised by the restaurant destination, and doubly surprised when everyone else walks in too.
Meals at the restaurant are long affairs, and tonight is no exception: we arrive at 6:15 and leave around 11:15. The theme for tonight’s dinner is “Solace of Winter”. Some of the standout dishes include a mushroom and smoked chicken stock, a cabbage stuffed with crab, a sturgeon course, and a Wagyu beef course. The conversation never flags, and everyone leaves content.
(Photo, from left to right: Jan, Angela, Anna, Brent, Valerie, Floyd, Tsering, Josie, and Misha)
We subscribe to a meal kit service and today’s box came with a crazy fractal cauliflower called Romanesco cauliflower.
We keep our cat carriers in a closet in Jan’s office near the front of the house. Our first cat, Nutmeg, associated her carrier with vet visits and would always go running if she saw use pulling it out.
But Mojo and Moxie like the carriers. We keep one carrier on a low shelf in the closet, and Moxie in particular likes to open the closet door (by banging on it for a long time) and climb into or on top of the carrier for a nap.