Hanging with Benjamin Franklin

We had yet another busy weekend of traveling.  The kids are getting to be experts in hearing the sentence, "Pack your bags, we are hitting the road early on Saturday morning."

This most recent weekend took us to Pennsylvania.  It was Jeff's family Hanukkah party on Sunday and this year it was his Aunt Miriam's turn to host.  We decided to make a weekend out of it and go up the day before.  Jeff came up with the idea to do the Franklin Institute in Philadelphia.  The kids and I have been about 3 times in the past years, but Jeff had never been.  We LOVE this museum!  It is easily in our top tier of most favorite places to go.  You know its a great museum when you plan to spend 5 hours and it's just not enough time.  As we were wrapping up our visit, Sam said, "Why do we need to leave?"  Jeff answered, "Don't worry, we will be back in 2016."  I said, "Don't you mean 2017 when we will be back in the area (Jeff's Aunt hosts every other year)?"   And Jeff said, "No, we can come back next year."   Wow!  For those that know Jeff and his aversion to plan trips that require money being spent, this is HUGE!

Some new things we did this time around at The Franklin Institute was the IMAX film "Everest".  Wow!  What a great documentary.  Those people who risk their lives to make it to the top are crazy and inspiring and brave.   The other new thing we saw was the "Brain" exhibit.  This was beyond cool.  It was multi-rooms of how the brain works, what it looks like, feels like, and exercises/effects that show how your brain can play tricks on you.  We had done this area first when we arrived and this was the area that Ian and Sam wanted to go back to and spend lots more time in.

After we left The Franklin Institute, we made our way to Dresher, PA and had dinner with good family friends.  They had recently moved from NoVa to PA and it was great getting to spend time with them.

The next morning was the Hanukkah party and some of the best latkes ever consumed.  Yummy!  It was a great party and its always neat to see the family grow (because more and more babies are being born, not because we are all getting fat!).

It was so warm that the we spent the majority of the party outdoors!

This wraps up our long string of weekend getaways and we will now have a relatively calm Winter Break. It will be nice to wake-up in our own beds for the next several weeks.