Today is the day

July 28, 2014

What a day!  It all started early this morning getting ready and heading in to DC for Kit’s interment.  The five of us had come all the way cross country as had Becky’s sisters Kaye and Dee and her brother-in-laws Mike and Greg.  Her cousin Amy was in DC for an education rally so she made it to, and then our hostess Julie and one of Kaye’s friends Amy rounded out our number.  Not bad for an interment all the way on the other side of the country from where Kit had lived the last 30+ years of her life.  We already had a well-attended memorial service for her back in March. 

The service was short but very nice.  I’m glad we all made it here.  Grandma Kit will be missed, but we know we’ll see her again someday.  Afterward, we decided to do some sightseeing in Washington DC.  I have been here several times with school groups, but we had some people in our group who hadn’t been to DC before.  Julie and I tag teamed acting as tour guides.  We started in Arlington since we were already there, and we saw the Changing of the Guard ceremony at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, JFK’s eternal flame and some of the other famous sights at the cemetery.  Becky even found her grandparents' and uncle's graves as well as the resting places of more distant relatives.  We did a lot of walking just at Arlington, and that was only the beginning. 

We then visited several of the monuments.  We started with the Marines memorial, squeezed in some lunch, and then we hit Lincoln, Vietnam, WWII, Washington Monument, Korean, MLK, FDR and Jefferson.  I missed MLK and Jefferson because I was moving the car once and just waited to pick people up once, but I have seen them all before so I was ok letting other people see them.  Julie had a pedometer on, and she said we walked around 10 miles today.  Our kids were tired by the end of the day, but they did great.  The weather even cooperated – not too hot or muggy, a few clouds to block out the sun on and off and a nice breeze for most of the day.  Julie, who is our resident local, said that today was the best day we could hope for to see the memorials in the middle of summer.  We came back to David and Julie’s house and had pizza and ice cream for dinner.  We had a great day, but I realize that this isn’t my best post.  I'm too tired right now to be very creative.  We love you, Grandma Kit.