NYC/DC Part 2

We're on day 4 now of our tour de DC/NYC. Day 1,2&3 are here.

We woke up the morning of day 4 and hit a fine local breakfast spot called Dunkin Doughnuts. That's right my friends, I went outside of my comfort zone, Starbucks, for the inferior DD. My sister kept pointing out cutesy, local breakfast eateries and I'm all like, "Do they have pink sprinkle doughnuts?" Like I said... not a diet conscious trip. We took our breakfast pastries and sugar water coffee to go and ate them underground in the subway tunnel. Clearly, one of my finer mom moments.

Killin' that blueberry muffin

Pink sprinkle doughnut.... a boy after my own heart

While riding the subway, Parker wanted to try holding onto a pole instead of sitting. I reminded him not to let his head whack the pole so he rode like this:

We fit right in. No one could tell we were tourist.

We rode the subway back to Central Park where it was our quest to find the Belvedere Castle and carousel... which not a single person who works in Central Park seems to know of it's existence. The walk to the castle was beautiful! Shakespeare's garden surrounds it which makes for pretty pictures (even if they choose some strange posses)!

The castle itself is tiny but the views are breathtaking! I high recommend the quick walk up the narrow stairwells for the views of the amphitheater, duck ponds, ball fields and NYC skyline!

Before we went to NYC, I asked each kid what they wanted to do. Parker wanted to see Iron Man and Spiderman which we checked off on day 3. Avery wanted to ride the carousel so that was today's mission. After a few mile walk and being misdirected like 5 times, we found it... and Avery cried because the horses are all boy horses (red, green & blue) but dammit, we were riding the carousel. It's OLD and beautiful and plays the quirkiest carousel music. We soaked up the quaintness of the experience despite a little toddler drama. It turned out to be one of the funniest parts of the trip. We've all experienced the built up of a dream only for reality to not meet our expectations....this was the 4 year old girl version of that! #toddlerproblems   I didn't even take a picture because in the moment I was all like "YOU WILL LIKE THIS! GET ON THE HORSE AND SMILE!"

After the carousel, we went potty, along with every other woman in the park. 45 minutes later, we had all relieved our bladders and acquired some new body art. SMART entrepreneurs had set up face painting stations by the potty line and they were making BANK entertaining potty dancing kids.

Iron man.... shocking, I know.

Happy Unicorn

We played in the playground for a while before heading to Starbucks for some fuel! We weaved our way around the Puerto Rican pride parade to Rockafella Center. The LEGO store was a big hit! I always enjoy seeing the news stations. What up Hoda and KLG?

At this point, the city was becoming overwhelming and the Puerto Ricans were being super super loud in their adoration of their nation so we retreated to Brooklyn for some downtime. On the way there, a passerby gave Avery a "selfie reflector," as in, a small reflective disk to reflect good lighting to your face for a selfie. Who knew there was such a product?! Well, she thought it was a frisbee and tossed it in the middle of a busy intersection. When Kelly and I refused to retrieve her selfie reflector we ended up with a sad unicorn. 

Unicorn Tears

That night, Kelly made us dinner...

... and then we called for Thai food take out. The kids were WIPED. We packed a bunch of NYC into 2 1/2 days!

Using Avery's face as a pillow

Once again, I was too verbose in my recap so now there will be a part 3 to recap our mini tour of DC and NYC with little kids tips. My kids still talk about this trip daily! We read our "NYC/DC road trip" Shutterfly book almost every night before bed. I'm so thankful to have had these precious memories with the kids and my sister!

As for "what I'm listening to"... my kids are obsessed with the website worship house kids. I think it's meant for churches to buy the videos and songs for kid's ministry but you can view them all from this website for free. Their favorites are "Super Wonderful" and "My God is Number One." They've been on repeat lately. There isn't a sweeter sound than hearing your children worship!

The videos are animated on the worship house kids website but here's the best I could find on YouTube. If you like the popular song "Oceans" by Hillsong, Yancy did a kid's version! Enjoy!

Daniel and Taylor Take NYC

This weekend, Daniel and I flew to NYC to visit my sister who lives in Brooklyn. It was the first time we've been away from the kids together for more than 1 night. They had a wonderful weekend with nana and poppi! I'm not sure they even missed us!

I've been to NYC before but Daniel had not. We took a cab from the airport to my sister's apartment which began our NYC cabbie experience. Who knew 1 way streets were just recommended? We finally made it to the general area where Kelly lives and we begged to just be dropped off on this corner RIGHT NOW!

We freshened up (which is humorous when you think about it because our next stop was... the subway) and headed to dinner in the East Village. We ate a yummy dinner at Yuca then met some of Kelly's friends at a bar. This is about the time that we realized we are OLD because by 11, I was about ready to curl up on the bar stool like a cat. Kelly hailed us a cab, the cabbie made a pizza stop for himself and ate it while driving us like Mario Andretti back to Kelly's apartment in Brooklyn. By 11:30, I was OUT!

The next morning, we were refreshed and ready to take in all the sites of the city! We grabbed some breakfast, some coffee and headed for the subway while supporting our Clemson Tigers!

1st we stopped at Grand Central Station. It is SO pretty! My camera wasn't on the right setting so I didn't get any usable pictures there. From Grand Central, we walked to Bryant Park. They were setting up an ice skating rink which will be beautiful at Christmas time! Confession: I got so excited because I recognized Bryant Park from an episode of Dateline with Chris Hanson where he interviewed a guy he found on Craigslist who will "make someone disappear"... so a hit man. Forget that Bryant Park is where fashion week used to be (according to my vast knowledge of fashion... ahem... Project Runway)...and how beautiful it was... OMG Chris Hanson! Dateline!

I really should have written down where all we walked but next we walked by Radio City Music Hall according to my pictures. We are big fans of America's Got Talent (and Heidi Klum!) so it was neat to see the building where that's filmed.

Next we saw Rockefeller Center. I loved watching the ice skaters and hearing all the different languages people spoke.

 We couldn't resist visiting the Lego store at Rockefeller Center. We bought Parker a Lego Batman keychain, Lego cup and minifigure ice cube tray which he LOVED! They also gave us a free Lego Iron Man poster which we lugged ALL OVER NYC and attempted to not crush.... we failed... but Parker was still THRILLED!

We visited 2 beautiful Catholic Churches and passed by FAO Schwartz on our way to Central Park. Kelly was the ultimate tour guide! At this point, I was regretting my choice of only bringing this one pair of boots on my trip. Now I understand the tennis shoes with panty hose and suit look.

Central Park was my FAVORITE part of our trip! It's SO pretty! The leaves are changing and I saw a few families taking family photos. We only saw a small amount of the park but I could have spent our whole trip exploring the park and zoo!

We stopped for a street pretzel before heading to the museum of natural history. You could spend HOURS here so if you ever go to NYC and you really want to visit this museum, allot at least half a day. We didn't have that much time so Kelly and I dragged Daniel through the museum and hit the highlights so we could get back outside! It was too nice to be inside looking at the evolution of man from apes etc... especially if you don't believe in all that crap. I did; however, enjoy the poisonous frog exhibition and watching my sister attempt to debate a curator over the age of the earth and how ridiculous it is to think that alligator anteater looking animals evolved into whales. It was also neat to see where "Night at the Museum" was filmed.... I did not; however, see Teddy Roosevelt or Sacagawea (yes I had to Google "Indian girl in Night at the Museum" for the spelling of that one!)

My pictures kinda stop here because we were TIRED and Daniel was officially done with photographing ourselves at every street corner :) He was a trooper, though!

We walked to Little Italy and ate then strolled through China town quickly because it is a pungent area of the city! Kelly hailed my poor feet a cab and I was happily in my PJs by 7pm, on the couch ready for the Clemson game. By 9, it was clear that my Tigers forgot to show up for that game and I passed out until 11 hours later. We woke up Sunday and toured my sister's area of Brooklyn where we got to see less touristy stuff. We "brunched" at Lokal and visited the Williamsburg Flea Market.

We began our "adventure" home by hailing a cab, only to have it blow a tire and then still charge us for the ride and leave us on the side of the road with our bags to find another cab. Thankfully, we did fairly quickly and made it to the airport without almost dying like our other cab rides! We were flying standby and all the flights to Charlotte filled up so we squeezed into the last 2 seats on a flight to DC in hopes of getting to Charlotte sometime Sunday! Once we got to DC, we ate the most glorious meal... Five Guys greasy burgers and fries. NYC has some great food but nothing beats the delicious grease of Five Guys. The gate agent told us that there was no way we were going to make the Charlotte flight because it also filled up, so we sat at that gate and ate while waiting for a Greenville SC flight. At least we would be closer to home, right?! God must have known how badly I wanted to get home to my babies because a family of 4 no showed and Daniel and I got on the last 2 seats on that flight too!

We really enjoyed visiting what seems like another country compared to where we live! MY sister loves it there and I can see why! It's so "her!" I understand why so many young single adults enjoy living there but other than the Upper West Side, I just don't think I could live there. I need trees, and backyards and a room for the kids trampoline! haha NYC is a great place to visit but I couldn't imagine raising a child there. Obviously, people do but I about had a heart attack each time I saw a child scootering by themselves down the street toward a busy intersection. I can see where summers in the parks would be fun but the winter months would be brutal! I loved seeing my sister and her city life but it reaffirmed my love of the suburbs with these 2!