The past couple weeks have been filled with all kinds of activities including a wonderful evening for Kelly's golf league, softball on the mall and a heavy dose of baby proofing the apartment in preparation for the Miles' visit.
After a weekend filled with sweltering heat, Monday brought a nice reprieve. With mild temperatures and a beautiful sunset, Kelly's monday night golf league was very pleasant.
Ben has continued to rehab his knee twice a week and is making good progress. Unfortunately he is still sidelined for softball, so Kelly has to represent the Ho-Latch name in our House of Representatives league. While her attendance has been inconsistent, she was able to play last week where the depleted Show-Me Asses suffered a 7- 21 loss.
While our small apartment seemed easy enough to baby proof, all of the cords, candles, chairs, bar stools, dog food/water/toys, etc etc, proved to be quite the task. By Friday evening the apartment was ready and we anxiously awaited the Miles arrival to D.C. After a few hugs and hellos, the twins were off to the races. They inspected every inch of the apartment, every hair on Dex and Mo and tried to open every door!
They had grown so much since our last visit. We spent the evening catching up and relaxing at the apartment Friday night.
We headed over to Annapolis on Saturday and showed them some of our favorite places. We visited the Maryland State Capitol, Naval Academy, downtown and made an unsuccessful trip to Cantler's Inn for crabs.
After a short siesta, we headed downtown to some of the monuments. Abbey is taking a class and we will spare you the details, but she has to take a picture with 6 of the monuments. Having see all the monuments in previous trips, we simply had to take a picture and move on to the next one. With Stephen and Ben dropping us off, we were able to get a picture at Washington, Lincoln, Korean, FDR, George Mason and Thomas Jefferson monuments/memorials in approximately 45 minutes.
Afterwards we rewarded ourselves with some ice cream and called it a day.
Sunday we headed to Georgetown for brunch at Filomena. It was a large and somewhat irresponsible amount of food, however it was all delicious. Layla gave two thumbs up on the bread.
In need some exercise, we walked down to the waterfront and strolled along the path. Our next stop was the Old Post Office.
Once used as a post office, it is now a sub standard food court complete. The highlight is the bell tower with fabulous views of the district.
One of the hidden treasures of D.C. is the National Building Museum. For our loyal readers, you will remember similar discussions last fall. We decided to take the Miles and show them around. It turned out to be an added bonus that the spacious carpeted main hall was great to let Jaxon and Layla run around.
While Stephen and Ben wandered around, Abbey and Kelly ran after the twins for about an hour.
After a quiet evening at the apartment, the weekend was over.
Early Monday the Miles klan headed out and we sluggishly started our week. Kelly struggled to put together a Chinese politics for her class while Ben started the morning with physical therapy.
After a long day, we headed to the Verizon Center for Team USA basketball.
The women's team started at 5:30 followed by the men's team at 8. While the men's team is the obvious draw, the women's team had an impressive roster. With 6 UConn alumni including Diana Tarraussi, we got to see the best women basketball players on one team.
They dominated the game scoring 99 points against Brazil. There were two failed dunks, which were disappointing, however just the attempt got the crowd excited.
The excitement in the arena was very high. During the last minutes of the women's game, some of the men's team came and sat down. This sent some into a frenzy, people begging for autographs or even a simple high five. Just minutes before tip off, President Obama made his entrance. While there was no announcement prior to the game regarding his attendance, the intense security check by the Secret Service was a good indicator that he would be there. His entrance created such a stir that the game was delayed for 5 minutes as the press regained their composure and got seated.
By the time Team USA took the court, it felt like the Verizon Center was going to explode. But it was the Brazilian team that had most of the fireworks in the first quarter. They took a 10 point lead and looked strong compared to Team USA's roster of superstars. After a few mega dunks by Lebron and Kevin Durrant, they settled into a rhythm and regained the halftime lead.
President Obama was joined by Michelle and one of his daughters. During the Kiss Cam (where they scan the crowd on the jumbo tron and couple's kiss) it came to President and Michelle. Either they didn't understand the gimmick or they chose to abstain, the crowd showed their disappointment.
Apparently they learned their lesson because later in the game the kiss cam came back to them and they gave the crowd what they wanted, a kiss.
They game was full of awesome dunks, showboating and very little defense-it was great!
They pulled out the 11 point victory in their last exhibition before they head to London next week for the Olympics. All the basketball led to a late night getting home, but overall it was a great experience.
