A visit to Monticello

The day before Foxfield, I had a comp day off of work so Evan, the kids, and I had some free time to spend in Charlottesville. While we could have easily found something to do there, we thought it would be nice to go out to Monticello, as Evan hadn't been there since college and I hadn't been since elementary or middle school (on a field trip). We were fortunate to have an absolutely gorgeous spring day to explore Mr. Jefferson's home!

There is an all new visitor entrance (I think it opened about 3 years ago?) that's really lovely. Included in the entrance is the Griffin Discovery room, designed for kids to learn about Jefferson and Monticello's history...and everything can be touched and played with!

They spent some time playing with the blocks (note that my children did NOT build the cool tower in the middle; that was there when we got there).

You can walk up to the main house or take a shuttle bus. The kids opted for the bus (which I was also fine with!) and it was the hit of the day for Henry. All he wanted was to stay on that bus. We ended up taking an extra ride around at one point to make him happy.
We arrived at the house and first went around to the south side where there are working vegetable gardens, vineyards, and gorgeous scenery. My kids only add to that :)

We were very close to the Jefferson family graveyard, so walked down the path to pay our respects. Here is the marker over Thomas Jefferson's grave. It's actually a large family plot, with 9 members buried under this monument. Current family members are still buried there today!

It was at this point that instead of turning around and walking back up to the house, we took the shuttle all the way back around and ended up back in front of the house. We then went around to the northern side of the house.

At the north pavilion, we hoped to be able to see the Rotunda, but the foliage was too dense. Guess that's a winter view! Instead we were treated to this loveliness.

It was break and snack time, which turned into family photo time.

At one point, Natalie started moping like crazy (I can't remember now what caused it), and was lying face down on the grass. Henry went next to her, and I wanted to try and get photos of them together. Evan was a fantastic assistant and started making both of them laugh, letting me get this great shot (similar to the one I had posted previously on facebook, but not exactly the same).