First stop of the day was in Richmond, VA for a quick look at the Edgar Allen Poe Museum. As an English teacher, this was obviously an exciting stop for Dane.
On the way, we were trying to explain to both Jake and Emma who Poe was and by the time we had given the plot to several of his stories, neither kid felt overly comfortable going in. Fortunately, the museum dealt more with his life in Richmond and less with the content of his stories. The building was beautiful and the garden was exquisite. They even had two black cats that roamed the property in homage to one of Poe's classic stories. It was neat to see some of the artifacts that I have discussed with my students over the years. Richmond itself (at least the part we saw) was very cool, with lots of street art and some really cool looking shops and restaurants.
For Richmond, we hopped back into the car and headed up I-95 to Quantico, VA for a visit at the United States Marine Corp Museum. All I can say is that if you are ever in the area, this is a MUST SEE museum. Jen had been on a field trip before and I thought she was over selling it, but I will say it ranks a close second to the Holocaust Museum in terms of education and interaction. 
It covers the history of the USMC from it's inception through all of our major military conflicts. Jake was in heaven with all of the airplanes and tanks. The only negative is that we got there at 4:00 and they closed at 5:00. We could easily have spent three more hours there. We stopped in the gift shop and I bought a spy decoder coin for the kids so that we could write secret messages to each other the rest of the trip. Emma and I exchanged a few codes about dinner, then Jake tried. After he dropped it into pieces in the van, all I can say is when we clean out the car maybe we can find the missing piece and use it again- :(.
From Quantico, we headed out to find dinner. In case you are wondering, just because it says a restaurant is off the exit in D.C., it doesn't mean it is actually anywhere near the exit.
The final stop of the day was in Jessup, MD for a quick round of Monster Mini Golf. This was one of the coolest indoor, glow-light golf courses I have experienced and it is apparently a chain across many states.
As usually, Dane won the round, but I must say was given quite a scare by Jake who only lost by one stroke. In fact, if he had not insisted on hitting it through a spooky clock instead of going around he might have won. Gail finally found her groove on the back nine and pulled ahead of Emma for third place with Jen taking pictures as usual (competition is not her thing). The coolest part of the whole thing was Jake spotting the day-glo painting of Poe with a Raven over his shoulder and getting so excited. We learned him something today. Yeah!!!
We finally rolled into Haddon Township, NJ around 11:30 pm to stay with Jen's cousin Sheri and her husband Tony. The kids couldn't with until this morning when they could play with their cousins, James and Katelyn.
Tony and Dane got up this morning and ran the Haddon Heights Firecracker 5K and then it was off to fun time at the parade and pool (until the rain). At this point, everyone is back home and ready for a well needed nap.
PS- I guess this is technically the cancer/chemo blog so I will update that as well. Chemo was good on Thursday and Jen felt great most of the day tomorrow. This morning she was able to go to the parade, but is now napping and I don't expect to see too much of her until Sunday night She said her scalp started to hurt yesterday and as a result, we saw a good bit of hair loss in the sink and shower. We took a minute to cry about that (mainly due to the great new hair cut) and will move forward from there. We brought the clippers and her fancy hats with us, so someone we are staying with will get the fun of that party.
Until later...... Happy Independence Day!!!!!!!!!!!!
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