Sisters Weekend DC!

For our 3rd annual Sisters Weekend, we decided to meet in Washington DC to celebrate Kristin's birthday (a couple months late, lol). I'm not sure how my sisters feel but this has become my favorite weekend out of the whole year these past few years. I love the chance to be with JUST my sisters, without a single other distraction to get in the way of our talking, shopping, site seeing, silly picture taking, and all around goofing off. Sam and I drove out on Thursday to Kristin's house and then Kelli, Kari, and Valerie flew in that evening (not all of us were able to be there this year, I'm sure we will find a weekend sometime in the future when we can ALL come)... Anyways, brace yourself because there are LOTS of pictures. Probably too many, but that's what happens when we all have iphones and picture sharing is so easy, lol.. 

The drive on back roads through the Virginia mountains was breathtaking! Soo beautiful:

Before we made it to Kristin's, we stopped at Sam's old home from when his Dad was mission president in DC (still the mission home). I'll do another post on that soon.. It was fun to see because he talks about it fairly often:

Everyone together! Our "5k" Friday morning on a path near Kristin's house. Yeah, I was definitely the slowest. I haven't quite caught the "running bug" yet. Someday I will, I'm sure..

All prettied up for a day of shopping at the outlet malls, woo!

Old Town Alexandria for dinner and window shopping. Such a fun place! I loved the nightlife and all the little boutiques. And that would've been a great picture on the right but I guess I didn't get the "pretty face" memo, haha:

Hot chocolate and a walk down to the Hudson. We were actually able to see the capitol from the pier, which was pretty cool. Oh and this is where my bro Tyson proposed to Valerie so it was fun to hear her memories of the place:

The pool and hot tub at our schwanky hotel. Nice to have the place to ourselves:

The next morning we took the Metro from the station right next to our hotel down to Eastern Market. Such a fun place! So many unique things.. I wanna go back some day when I have more spending money, hehe:

Breakfast at a little corner bakery right near the shops. Best hot chocolate ever: 

Some fun market stuff:

Pluot? Cross between a plum and an apricot. So delicious, we had to buy some. Oh and Val and Kristin bought the most gorgeous photograph collage of the four seasons in DC. They were amazing:

Diet coke and pluots break:

Took the Metro back to the National Mall, which isn't really a "mall" but rather a sort of square where you can see a lot of the famous DC buildings and monuments:

Haha, group picture fail:

And finally, we headed over to one of Kristin's favorite malls for a little while before meeting Neal and Sam for dinner at one of her favorite restaurants..

I really do think I have the best sisters in the world. Each one of them is so amazing in their own way. It's so interesting to me how we are all different but all so alike at the same time. We end up complimenting each other perfectly. I love them so much and am so grateful for all they have ever done for me in my life. Not sure where I would be without the awesome support of my sisters. Love you and miss you already! Until next year!!

Oh and a BIG thank you to Sam for watching Ivy while I was gone. I am so grateful for an awesome husband who lets me have a good break when I need it. I don't think he got very bored though. I'll do a post next on his mission home and what he was up to while we were gone...