Girl’s Weekend in DC

Each year, it has become tradition to enjoy a Girl’s Weekend with my college roommate, Meg, and her mom, Kathy.  Last year they came down and we had a weekend at the beach with a day-trip to Charleston.  We decided to switch scenery and head to Northern Virginia where they live. 

It was a very enjoyable weekend which started when we left early Friday morning.  Ben had a weekend warrior project of installing a new microwave and re-tiling the kitchen backsplash!  After arriving at The Borghi’s, we shopped at Reston Town Center where I finally found a cream and blue shell dish to keep all of my jewelry.  Kathy made a delicious dinner of Caprese Salad, crusty bread and Mushroom Ravioli.  We ended Friday night with Confessions of a Shopoholic. 

Saturday morning started out with a run for me and my mom followed by breakfast al-fresco on their amazing deck.  We all showered then headed for our lunch reservation at he The British Tea Pantry in Aldie, VA.  We had so much fun sipping tea and the quiche was delish! We spent the afternoon wandering in and out of shops in historical Middleburg and then made a quick shopping trip to the Leesburg outlets where I found two outdoor pillows for our Adirondack chairs and a tall floor vase for the curly branches I purchased almost a year ago for our bedroom.  For dinner we ordered in, invited a few friends over and spent the entire night emptying bottle after bottle of wine, chatting in true girl’s style!

Sunday was deemed museum day.  It’s been forever since any of us had been to the museums on The Mall in DC…after breakfast we headed towards the metro with a quick stop at Meg’s condo.  Meg is an interior designer and I love seeing all the new things she’s found and work they have done on their condo.  By lunch, we had arrived at the National Gallery of Art and decided to have lunch in the cafe by this really cool waterfall.  After we had all intentions of touring the museum, but I think we spent more time in the cafe – we came back for gelato -  and shopping in the gifts shops.  I had never seen the Hope Diamond, so we finished off the day with a tour of the Smithsonian. 

Monday morning was a lazy one and we got on the road by 12 noon.  We decided to make a detour for another first -  IKEA!  Wow…how have I made dozens of trips to Northern VA and never stopped in IKEA!  I got out of there under $100 with the biggest shopping bag I have ever seen. 

By this point I was anxious to get home to see the Big Kitchen Remodel of ‘09…once we arrived home I could not have been more proud of Ben and his hard work.  The kitchen looks amazing and better than I could have ever imagined.  I think I should take more long weekends away and leave him with weekend projects more often!  I’ll have to see what projects I can come up with another big project by the 2010 Girl’s Weekend!