One of the best things about living in the DC area is the friends and family who find themselves coming through. It means we get to see way more friendly and loved faces than we did in the ten years in our smallish Pacific northwest home. I have a blow-up bed— one that doesn’t even deflate in the middle of the night!— and these fine accommodations draw friends from far and wide. This week it’s my brother (Bean’s namesake) in town on business. He took a day off to spend traipsing around the mall and hitting the various Smithsonians with us…The Natural History Museum is the kids’ favorite, and Bean spent about an hour in the live butterfly room. Jeffrey wasn’t happy about this butterfly on his head. There were hundreds of butterflies, tiny and giant, flitting about, and even after my brother and Jeffrey took off to the hall of gems, Bean refused to leave the butterflies. It’s hard to see amid the flowers, but there are scads of butterflies here.Here is a large one that hung out on Bean’s butt for quite a while.But this little cute one on Abby’s nose was the favorite, though I’m pretty sure she’d have freaked out if one of the big ones had chosen her face to rest.We ended the afternoon on the mall by walking down to Lincoln, where Abby and Jeffrey were too pooped to do anything but complain, but Bean was quite happy. He loves walking the entire mall.