Jill Biden, wife of Vice President Joe Biden hosted an open house at the Naval Observatory Wednesday afternoon. It is the first open house hosted at the Naval Observatory the day after an inauguration in recent history and was meant to continue the administration's theme of openness to the public.
A group of children were first welcomed by Biden's son Hunter Biden, who chatted with the children about the house and their hobbies, asking some if they played sports and what they thought of the home.
"Pretty neat house, huh?" he asked one group of children.
Biden began welcoming students from Bruce-Monroe Elementary School in the living room area of the house. Students entered the front door and were ushered through the foyer into the living room. The room was decorated with off-white and cream colored furniture. A fire was lit in the fireplace and a framed photo of the Biden family rested above it.
JBiden greeted each student individually, asking their names and what grade they were in.
The students, many carrying cameras, took pictures as they waited in line. Biden knelt and poised for several pictures with the children as they made their way to greet her. The children were dressed in dress outfits -- the boys in slacks and many of the girls wearing dresses.
"Welcome to my home," Biden told each child.
She asked some of the students why they had been selected to take the field trip, adding, "Is it because you're the smartest?" Biden told the students that her children were in the house and that if they saw them to stop and talk to them.
Much of the Biden family was on hand for the open house. Hunter Biden's daughter Finnegan Biden was with her father and talked to some of the students. Joe Biden's son Beau Biden, Delaware attorney general who is on leave from deployment in Iraq as a member of the Delaware National Guard, was also at the Naval Observatory. He accompanied Joe Biden's sister Valerie Biden-Owens and her husband Jack Owens to the upstairs of the home.
The children, who traveled with teachers and administrators from the school, were lead through a study area and back to the foyer. They were taken to a tent outside the home where they were served cookies.
Jill Biden also greeted the teachers who accompanied the students. She told Irina Malykhina, 46, assistant principle at Bruce-Monroe Elementary School, and Narda Valdivia, 42, first grade Spanish teacher at Bruce-Monroe Elementary School, that she was delighted to have them at her home.
"You know I'm an educator," she told the teachers. "I'm so happy to have teachers here today. Thank you for what you do."
Malykhina said it was a "big privilege and honor" to be invited to the home. "It is wonderful to know that she's an educator," she addedd. "You can really see her passion for children."
Valdivia said the tour was a learning experience for the students to visit the home and meet Biden. "Coming here they couldn't stop talking about it and asking questions," she said.
Both teachers said the experience for the children was heightened by the personal attention Biden gave each one, making it a "memorable moment" as she "shook each one of the hands and greeted them all personally."
-Adapted from pool report
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