Fun Fun Fun …

... until someone takes her hammer away.

Ours is an older house. Built in 1940 (according to the papers we signed when we bought the place) or 1941 (going by the information the city submitted to the National Register of Historic Places when it was seeking to expand the Historic District — surprisingly, our house is considered as contributing to the historic nature of the area), it has lots of little things that need attention upon occasion and more than a few things that are hard to repair/replace with off-the-shelf gear from the hardware store. Therefore, I was quite interested in the Festival of Building Arts (FOBA) at the National Building Museum. I figured it would give Celeste a chance to pick up some plastering skills or something.

Actually, it was a rainy day, so it made sense to find a good in-doors thing for Saturday, and the FOBA fit the bill. Since the National Building Museum is right outside the Judiciary Square Metro exit, we took the train, which Celeste was quite thrilled by. Quinn (who spent the entire time in the BabyBjörn) also liked watching the scenery along the Red Line roll past.

Once in the museum, Celeste was a little overwhelmed, running around (and nearly into more than a few people) from exhibit/station to exhibit/station. The only hands-on thing she did, however, was using letter stamps to hammer letters into a piece of cedar. She actually really got into the hammering and the letters. She did take a look at exhibits/stations on green roofs, bamboo flooring^*, pipefitting, and a few others. She also got a personalized Home Depot orange apron.

Celeste then moved us up to the second floor, where she discovered the Building Zone exhibit. "Looks like playgroup!" she said when she walked in and saw the toy house and blocks and other construction play gear. While Evelin and Celeste played in the Building Zone, Quinn and I took in the "Investigating Where We Live: Anacostia" exhibit.

Meeting back up, we all took in a few more exhibits/stations and then had a snack and a trip through the gift shop (Celeste wanted a book, as did I, but we only ended up getting a few postcards for me to send overseas via Postcrossing at some point. The train to Brookland got us back to the parking lot just in time to catch the end of the Brookland Day Festival parade.

^*Maybe we were early enough in the day that the booth staff hadn't been asked before, but I did get a pretty good laugh out of one of the American Society of Interior Designers people if with the bamboo flooring you had to worry about termites or just marauding pandas. Actually, the woman who was talking to me started to answer seriously, but the guy on the stand with her doubled over.
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