Travelog for: Ebba

My name is Ebba. I am going to be a present next year for a nice woman who always wanted to go to the USA for a year as an au pair but could never quite work up the courage. So I want to spend a year travelling through different households in the US before I come to her with my travelog.
I like kids a lot and would be happy to see how they live. I also like all animals, but esp. cats, just please don't let them scratch me or eat me!
I am going to start the USATVT next week. Wish me luck!

Hello from the United States! I arrived this afternoon to a fuzzy welcoming committee of Fllama, Plaid Moose, and Jimbo Elephant!

I haven't gotten to look around too much - I spent much of the afternoon taking a long nap and getting to know my new friends - but I hear that we'll be out and about tomorrow!

Hello! Mara had a bunch of errands to run today, so we hopped in her bag and went along! First stop was the post office to say goodbye to Fllama and send him on his next adventure:

Then we went to Target - it's a huge store, and since it's close to where I am staying, Mara goes a lot!

After a few more stops, we were all hungry, so Mara took us out to lunch at Boston Market:

Here I am eating my lunch - yummy!

Hello! It was a beautiful day here today (it's been raining a LOT lately), so we all headed to Old Town Alexandria for the Festival of the Arts - a big arts fest in the streets of Old Town. Old Town is where George Washington grew up, and is not only a historic area but a really neat place with shops and restaurants. Here I am walking around the arts festival...

There was lots of cool art, but the steel sculptures were our favorites. I really liked this one of a tree with birds!

While we were walking around, we took a break at the fountains in Old Town - look how beautiful it was out today!

Afterwards, we walked down to the waterfront. Alexandria is near Washington DC on the Potomac River. Here I am in front of the Potomac:

And here I am in front of the Torpedo Factory:

It used to be used to make torpedoes (you could probably have figured that out!), but now it is an artist colony! What an amazing day!

I've been getting a good sense of what day to day life is like here in Virginia. Mara has let me tag along a lot, and it's been nice to see where she lives. So, here are a few pictures of where I've been this week...
We started the week off going to the new library. It just opened a few months ago, and it's really nice. Here I am in the front:

And here I am looking for a book!

In the middle of the week I went with Mara to Let's Dish. It's a meal preparation place - you go and you make a bunch of dinners for the month that go in the freezer. Here I am in front:

And here I am helping out by making enchiladas!

Today it was raining really hard, so we sat in the car while Mara's husband ran into the store to get stuff for her rabbits (can you tell how hard it was raining from the picture??)

Thankfully, the rain stopped long enough for us to get some lunch. We went to a popular place called Noodles & Company where Mara and I shared Wisconsin Mac & Cheese (they are famous for it!) Yum-O!

Shana Tovah! That means Happy New Year in Hebrew! This week we celebrated Rosh Hashana - the Jewish New Year - and I helped! Here I am helping to set the table for a family dinner...

And here we all are putting a cover on the round challah that Mara's family ate!

And I celebrated the new year the traditional way - eating apples dipped in honey! Yum!

Hello! Over the weekend, a new visitor arrived! I helped to open up the package and welcome Pebbels!


I had never met a tiger before, but she's really friendly! She showed us her travel journal - she has been to some really neat places!

My host and her husband play softball on the weekends. So a few of us hopped into Mara's bag to check it out! Here I am at the field (Mara is upset that the camera cut the bottom of the picture off, but you can still see me!)

And here we are sitting in the bleachers to watch the game!

What a beautiful day it was here today! It's nearly the middle of October, but it was sunny and 70 degrees out! So we headed into Fairfax City for the Fall Festival, a big fair with lots of arts & crafts, food, and activities for kids. Mara says that there are lots of fairs like this here in the fall - each town has one! Here I am on one of the streets looking at the crafts booths:

I also got to see some of the history of Fairfax. Here I am in front of the courthouse:

It was built in 1800 - here is a plaque that explains the history:

And here I am (still in front of the courthouse) on one of the Civil War cannons!

I have had a great trip to Virginia! But I am leaving in the morning to my next host. So as I am getting packed tonight, I also said my goodbyes. First I said goodbye to Mara's bunnies - as a fellow rabbit, we have become good friends!

Then I said goodbye to my Toy Voyager friends.

I have had a good visit, and am excited for my next adventure!

Here is a picture of me with the friendly beast Charlie I met while out walking in the yard.

I have arrived with my new host and took a quick look around at the mountains.

Its been cold and windy so my host has left me to hang out on a nice warm shelf above the computer but today I got to go out for a drive. 
We went to the train station to meet a sailor that was coming home.
The train was late and it was a very long wait.

Wow.  What a change in scenery all of a sudden.  My host whisked me away today to Washington DC.  We had to get out of bed and down to the airport in Grand Junction while it was still dark.  We flew from there to Denver and after breakfast at the airport there we hopped on a long flight to Washington DC and arrived in time for supper. 



Tomorrow we will be part of the Veterans Day activities at Arlington Cemetery.

Today we are wandering around downtown looking at the sights.  I did get to Arlington Cemetery yesterday and we had lunch at a seafood place on the waterfront that had a huge salad bar for me to graze at. 



We didn't get any pictures though because my host was part of the ceremonies so she had her friend in charge of the camera.  But I was there, and even helped place a wreath at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier but I stayed quiet in my hosts pocket.

Today was all the big buildings downtown -- and a quick trip into chinatown for lunch.  Then we had to hurry to the airport in Dulles VA.







We saw a Smithsonian exhibit, the Women's Art Museum and the International Spy Museum.  Then we ate at a Mongolian Grill and walked back to the Hotel through a park.