Guys Weekend!

While we were in PA, Jeremy and Steve took Marshall and Zachary down to Maryland for a "Guys Only Weekend".  They met up with 2 more fun uncles, Joel and Jay who joined them in their testosterone filled adventures.

First up was a Washington National's game.

If you've met Marshall, you know that he loves history and even more than that, he LOVES Abraham Lincoln.  And an 8 ft tall Abraham Lincoln?  Why all the more to love!

He is like a little walking Abe dictionary.  Seriously.  Want to know anything Abe (or FDR... or Milton Hershey) related?  Just call and ask him.

 They had Five Guys (YUUUUM!) before arriving at the stadium, but with Daddy staring down the barrel of yet another deployment and missing his little man already, Marshall was also able to talk him into a pretzel, a soda in a souvenir cup and some ice cream in a souvenir ball cap bowl.

 Daddy and his Man-Cub

My men are so cute!

 The game was a real nail-biter with the Nat's beating the SF Giants, 6-5 at the bottom of the ninth.  People had already started to leave due to a combination of hopelessness and the late hour when the Nat's came back to win it.

When the final run was hit, the stadium erupted and both boys were up jumping and yelling.  Needless to say, Marshall and Zachary were two happy, super excited guys!  We are 2 for 2 in getting our money's worth out of ball games!

That night, they stayed at Joel and Jay's apartment.  They got up the next morning, had breakfast at IHOP and headed downtown to Ford's Theater.  I didn't know that the actual brick and mortar building was still standing, so it was pretty cool that Jeremy did and knew right where to take Mr. Marshall Lincoln.

 Marshall and the booth where Abraham Lincoln was sitting when he was shot.

 This is Marshall standing by the stage where the secret path that John Wilkes Booth took to get to the president is located.  Around his neck is a "radio device" (his word, not mine) that was like a personal tour guide for him.  You hold the radio up to your ear like a phone and a child tells the story as pictures come up on the screen.

 Marshall and the exact "single shot Duranger pistol" that killed Lincoln.

They also went across the street to the "Peterson House" where Lincoln died the next day at 0722.  The actual deathbed is also on display there.

Sweet little boy was all tuckered out and on his way back to PA.  It's hard to see in this picture, but Jeremy told me he was drooling.  ;)

I have to tell you a funny story.  A few weeks after they came home from their big guys weekend, Marshall initiated the following conversation with me.  I know it had to be weighing heavily on his little mind because he seemed so sad about the subject and it took him so long to bring it up to me:

Uncle Joel and Uncle Jay are poor.

They are?  What makes you say that?

At their house, the carpet on the stairs has holes in it, the bathrooms are really dirty AND they have a friend who comes over every night and watches tv on their SOFA!  

(all said lovingly, but with a somewhat horrified look on his face)

I, of course, then had a talk with him about how it isn't that they are poor, that the house is a rental, so they aren't going to put money into it to fix the basement stairs.  We also talked about the concept of roommate vs. neighbor who barges in to watch tv every night.  But sorry, J&J...no matter how poor you are, I had to tell him that there's no excuse for dirt.  ;)

Unfortunately, even after saying all of that, when the "boys" as they will forever be to me came to visit in September, Marshall was getting his room ready to share.  I walked past my dresser and saw some money sitting on it.  Thinking it came from a pair of pants I was wearing another day, I swooped it right up and put it in my pocket.  Marshall saw this and rather politely asked if I had seen the money on the dresser.  When I said yes, he told me it was his.  I asked him why it was on my dresser and he hung his head a little, shrugged and said "Because Uncle Jay is going to stay in there".  Well, let me tell you, I could barely contain my laughter as I assured him once again that they weren't poor and that Uncle Jay certainly was not a thief... and besides, Uncle Jay's girlfriend, the super duper nice and cute Heyni would be staying in his room.  He said ok, but he put that money right back on my dresser, where it stayed until those shifty-eyed uncles took themselves back to their shanty where they belong.