Happy Birthday, Mister President

For President's Day today, we decided to head down to Mount Vernon, home of George Washington, to celebrate his birthday since they were waiving the entrance fee. Other than battling the legions of people who also had the same idea, the irritating traffic police who sent us over a mile in the wrong direction when we were trying to park, and some minor rain, we had a good time.

Once we got there, Miss America 2010 was on hand to sing the National Anthem and George Washington was there to welcome us to his estate. Miss America is the one in the checkered overcoat - honestly she didn't seem to be overwhelmingly beautiful. There was then a fife and drum corps of the Army in Revolutionary War style uniforms that performed along the parade grounds. I enjoyed watching and listening to them, but the pictures didn't turn out that great.


We made our way to the wharf (in the background of my picture) where we enjoyed relaxing along the banks of the Potomac River.



A common theme when we are going anywhere with Snoopy is how well he will handle the unfamiliar surroundings and how many people will notice how cute he is and want to pet him. We were impressed with him on this trip - he has gotten so much better dealing with crowds and things. He didn't quite know what to make of some of the farm animals at Mount Vernon though...

This ram kind of freaked him out:


He did a little better with this ewe - after some encouragement, they sniffed each other's noses!


The bull was being lazy and Snoopy didn't mind sitting there and just getting petted :-) The figure in the yellow rain coat is one little girl that couldn't keep her hands off Snoopy. We lost track of how much attention he got from strangers, but there were two toddlers barely able to stand that gave him pets (one almost fell on top of him and gave him a huge bear hug), one lady who decided he was so cute he needed to be picked up and kissed (dusty butt and all), and many other kids and adults giving him all kinds of love. I think he really enjoyed this little outing. And the fact that he tolerates the little kids squeezing him is a good indication that he will behave well with Karina.


The forecasted rain started to come around noon, and since we couldn't really go inside the museum exhibits or the mansion house with Snoopy, we were ready to call it a morning and head back home. It was a good way to spend a federal holiday and we enjoyed being together.