Air and Space Museum - Dulles

One of the really cool things about living near Washington DC are all the FREE Smithsonean museums here!! We have been to almost all of them (National Zoo, Air & Space - Downtown DC, Museum of Natural History, etc). The Air and Space museum actually has two parts - one in downtown DC (which we have been to a few times) and one near the Dulles Airport in Chantilly, VA. We were trying to get our minds off the Boise State loss so Sheridan and I decided to head out to the Air and Space museum near the airport. It is free to get into, but parking is $15 -- unless you get there after 4pm (they close at 5:30) then parking is free! So, we were only there for an hour and a half, but that was just about as much time as Lincoln would last so it worked out.

We had taken family pictures that morning (which, by the way, turned out so awesome!! I can't wait to get them all so I can share them with everyone). Sheridan took a quick photo before we headed to the air and space museum.

Right when you walk in there is this AWESOME plane!! It looks like a stealth plane, but it actually wasn't one. They said you could fly this plane from LA to DC in 90 minutes. Amazing! My pictures are really blurry throughout this post - sorry! I am still trying to figure out the settings on my camera.

Lincoln was being sweet when we first got there....not so much by the time we left....

Same plane "Lockhead SR-71A Blackbird"

This picture doesn't do it justice, but there are so many awesome planes in the background here!

So cool....

You can't see it in this picture very well, but there is a really cool Marines helicoptor (Sikorsky HO5S-1) behind Lincoln.

So cool!

Lincoln was being feisty!! He refused to sit in his stroller and would scream and scream until we took him out. Then once we took him out he would go crazy and wanted to run everywhere!! He still trips often though and so it was a battle to get him to let us hold his hands while he walked. We ended up doing a lot of "1-2-3 Wheeeee!"

Sheridan thought these Navy planes were cool

Lincoln running around everywhere

I tried to get Sheridan and Lincoln in this shot, but Lincoln wouldn't stand still to get a clear shot!!!

M*A*S*H anyone?

This is the HUGE HUGE HUGE Enterprise space shuttle that they have right when you enter the "space" part of the museum. Sorry this picture is blurry!! I had my camera on "museum" setting, but that didn't flash which caused some of my blurry photos.

Here is a better one...

Tons of satellites they had displayed

Top view of all the awesome airplanes they have

Lincoln loved looking at the helicoptors! Look at the dinky helicoptor behind Sheridan! Could you imagine how scary that would have been to be riding in that thing!

Now THIS would have been scary!! This was engineered for the Marines (although they never ended up mass-producing them). You sit on that little ledge there and buckle yourself in and steer with the rod on top. SCARY!!!!