Happy Birthday Candy and a little air and space

The birthday queen wishes Candy a very wonderful birthday! As always - lots of cake, ice cream and presents all day!

Here's the card i sent Candy. I used my Purple Onion Designs Pink Flamingo Alpha and the frame around it is from the POD vintage journaling set. The little bowl and decorating bag are little smackerels of mine. I used EP for the cake frosting - it looks kinda cool in real life.

The other day I went on a little excursion with my sister and little nephews. We went to the Air & Space Museum - the Udvar-Hazy location by Dulles airport (not the mall museum in DC). Although this branch of the A&S has been open for a few years this was my first time to visit. My husband and daughter have both been there before. It's about 15-20 minutes from the berg which is really a whole lot easier than going into DC - especially with 2 young boys.
it was pretty fascinating. It is a little different than other museums in that its an open floor plan. Tons of planes and other items like space shuttles - why not fill all the available space in a hangar - on the ground and up in the air! Planes hanging from the ceilings and all over the floor space. Planes everywhere you go!

There's a Concord and a Space Shuttle

(if you look closely you'll see Air France - that's the Concord if you're not familiar) And the picture of the space shuttle - look closely toward the bottom of the picture - you can tell just how big it is when you see people next to it.

I think my favorite small plane was this one that was painted up to look like a shark!

There were planes from every era imagineable as well as engines and clothing from airlines and soldiers - anything and everything you could think of. Interesting thing is all the contents of this location of the Air & Space is only a portion of what the Smithsonian has to show. They opened this museum because there was so much and no place to put it! (you can't exactly tuck a shuttle or some German war planes into a closet now can you?) The only thing i wasn't thrilled with was the McDonald's right there on site. Yes. A Mickeyd's right there inside the museum along with the required museum gift shop. But i guess that's just me. Anyway they've also got an observation tower (which appears to be an air traffic control tower) as well as an IMAX theater - both of which we didn't bother with on this trip. It was a nice afternoon spent with my sister (and nephews) - and a cooler alternative than much else we could do that is for sure. It's been pretty darn hot. That was on Tuesday and i believe the temps almost hit 100.

ok... I'm hoping to post some more drawings tomorrow. gotta get moving on today!