Washington, DC: Hunger in America Day 8

Day 8: Saturday, May 25. For the last weekend we were participating in a "retreat" through the church we were staying at. On Saturday morning we started with a relaxed pancake breakfast, followed by a silent hour long walk through the downtown area, in which we were to observe, reflect, and just have some quiet time in the city. We were then sent to take a short walk up to a park where there are often homeless people, but we came upon a Monsanto protest right at one end of the park, so there was a lot going on. The rest of the day we had free until dinner. I took my friend Jem to explore around Eastern Market for a bit, where we talked to some strangers and I got yelled at for taking a picture (and unfortunately I didn't notice my camera was on a weird setting so the photos aren't great, but you still get an idea of the colors and character of Eastern Market). We had a chill evening back at the church, going to bed early (technically, not actually) as we had an early morning for our last day in the city!

^^creative cooking^^

^^my second ever Pitango (first was in Baltimore)^^

^^Tracey made frito pie for dinner, which is apparently a Texas thing. It was tasty!^^

Day 7
Day 6
Day 5
Day 4
Day 3
Days 1 and 2

- From the desk of Mrs. M

Washington DC: Hunger in America Day 7

Day 7: Friday May 24. In the morning we got lost walking around a residential neighborhood for a while, trying to find our way to the Capital Area Food Bank, for a short visit walking around their facilities and hearing a bit about their services and programs. At the end of the week we packed up to move out to our second home for the trip, Church of the Epiphany. Luckily it was only a few blocks away, though I'm sure it was a sight to see twenty of us walking the downtown streets with all of our luggage and bedding! We dropped off our things and headed out a ways to Alafia Baptist Church in Maryland, where we had lunch and then spent the afternoon doing service projects. The majority of us went to Richardson Dwellings, a low-income, black neighborhood, where we sorted through donated food and clothes, and brought food bags right to people's doors. Our guide was a little boy who knew just where we had to take the bags (and warned us what areas we should not go to). Afterwards we checked out their community garden, which was pretty great with lots of colorful signs.We had dinner at a nearby school with the little kiddos, which was really fun, getting to talk to them for a while. Of course, we went to the White House again in the evening, with a stop at McDonald's (I got hot chocolate since it was quite chilly out) before returning to the church (where we were locked in for the night).

^^little garden at the Food Bank^^

^^little strawberries under there^^

Day 6
Day 5
Day 4
Day 3
Day 1 and 2

- From the desk of Mrs. M

Introducing

Meet Luna! 

I will share more about her later, but I wanted to let you know that indeed, we have adopted a pup! She is about one year old, just under 50 pounds, and a lab/boxer mix (though she is small for both those breeds). I got her on the 31st at the Fort Hood Stray Animal Shelter. She came with the name Luna and I didn't see any reason to change it. Adoption was kind of a risk because you often don't know exactly what you're going to get, but I somehow lucked out and got the most well-behaved dog ever, plus she and the cats have been doing fine together (a big relief!). She knows to sit, stay, lay down, no, come, fetch, shake, up, and go to her kennel. She has not once barked even with all the neighborhood dogs barking at her, housebroken, she moves off the path when other people are walking, walks fine on a leash, loves the backyard and playing fetch, and she's super cute. She is a little nervous around new things and new people, but she's kind of the best.

- From the desk of Mrs. M

Quarter Century

I turned 25 back on the 22nd of July! I'm not super into my birthday (better than being disappointed), but considering the circumstances, this one was pretty good. It was very chill; I enjoyed the royal baby crazy going on through the day (I totally called ahead of time that it would be born on the 22nd!), and met up with a few friends for dinner at Megg's, after which we went to see The Conjuring. Scary movies make me laugh, and oh how this made me laugh. I ran some errands in the morning, and got myself some frozen yogurt in the afternoon, too. As I posted on facebook, here are some of my favorites from the day. Thanks for all the love- you make my world. :)

Favorite royal baby: Duh
Favorite email/letter: Kyle
Favorite text: tie between Matt who indulged my royal baby jokes and Durwesh who told me to "please do something!"
Favorite new experience: chicken and waffles for the first time. Still confused, but not bad.
Favorite thing that made me laugh: seeing The Conjuring with Olivia and Venee, and that girl who ran squealing out of the theater.

^^Venee brought What About Cupcakes for us to split/try!^^

^^the best! big bag of veggies from Olivia's garden! Now I don't have to grocery shop for a while!^^

^^I really enjoy the creativity of movie theater carpets^^

PS- Happy belated, HRH! I look forward to celebrating every year with you. 

- From the desk of Mrs. M