NYC - Day Two

We woke up on our second day in NYC to the sound of pounding rain.  Not exactly how we were hoping to start our day.  I had brought a cute little umbrella that fit nicely in my purse in case it rained.  The second I stepped outside, I realized there was no way that little cute thing would hold up to a NYC downpour.  We quickly found a street vendor wandering around selling umbrellas, taking advantage of us poor, fool tourists.

 We headed straight to a cart to get ourselves a street bagel.  Holy yumminess...I could get used to one of those every morning to start my day!  We huddled in some random corner of a street to stay dry and somewhat warm while we sipped hot chocolate and ate.  It was actually quite disgusting that we were eating/sitting there.

Sam was most excited to find Dylan's Candy Bar which was owned by Ralph Lauren's daughter.  It was a perfect place to pretend it wasn't raining buckets outside and stay warm and happy.   

Because of the rain, wind, and freezingness it was hard to do much walking around so we ended up doing lots of window shopping.  Nate had his happy party in Nike Town, we checked out all the high end shops on 5th Avenue, visited the Apple Store, fantasized about buying something at Tiffany, and ended up frozen and starving and eating at the ever-glamerous Olive Garden in Times Square.  Who goes all the way to NYC and eats at Olive Garden?  Well. . . we were cold and they had soup.

That night, we bundled up and headed out to Yankee Stadium for a baseball game.  I have to say I wasn't ultra excited, considering how cold and rainy it still was.  I kind of hoped all day they would cancel the game. . . but they didn't so I layered every last thing in my suitcase and we were off on a most exciting subway ride.  I have never in my life been so close to so many people as on that ridiculously crowded subway train.  It was quite an adventure! 

 

These poor people were pure crazy.  It was kind of like going to a really sad show!  Drunk, stoned, passing out on each other.  Nuts.

Nate was in heaven walking in to Yankee stadium and I am so glad he was able to see his team play!  It was a beautiful stadium and I'm sure we would have loved it if it hadn't felt like we were in the arctic.  Apparently New Yorkers are fair weather baseball fans because we pretty much had the stadium to ourselves.  

We lasted till the 7th inning and headed back to the hotel for long, warm baths to try to warm our chilled bones.  It was such a fun day though, despite the rain and cold!

NYC - Day One

 Nate and I were lucky enough to go to NYC and then Boston with our good, good friends Sam and Jared Holland.  It was a dream vacation for me and so fun to finally see all these famous East Coast landmarks.  We left our cute kiddos home and left the SLC airport at midnight.  When we landed in NYC at 6 am eastern time, we were all a bit groggy, but dropped our luggage in the hotel lobby and headed out to explore. 

 

The New York Public Library was beautiful.

 

We took a trip to the top of the Empire State Building. . . so pretty up there.  And so fun to see the whole city from above.

We stopped off for a quick hot dog stand snack.  And by we. . . I don't mean me.

 

So much fun walking across the Brooklyn Bridge.

 Our next stop was the 9/11 Memorial.  It was quite a walk as we tried to find it, and we were getting pretty tired from our all-nighter followed by massive touristing, but it was definitely a highlight of the trip.  What an amazing, reverent feeling was there.  We felt goosebumps as we walked into the square where the beautiful memorial was and where those towers once stood.  Looking at the names engraved in the stone and realizing that these people had lives, and loved ones and people who come there to mourn them hit me so hard.  None of us wanted to leave.  What a beautiful and peaceful tribute this place is.

 

We finally were able to check into our hotel room after this so we headed back to take a little siesta and clean up a bit.  Our hotel room was so pretty and had the most beautiful views of the city.  I couldn't help looking out the window and smiling at the fact that I was actually there!

 

For dinner we headed to the famous Katz Deli in Soho.  It was such a fun walk through Soho, even though most of the quaint shops were closed.  The Katz Deli is famous for their pastrami.  I didn't really know what that was. . . nor did anything else on the menu look like my kind of food, so I just went ahead and ordered it.  I'm pretty sure that was my worst decision of the trip.

Thankfully we chased that pastrami down with the most delicious cupcakes at Georgetown Cupcakes.  Why are cupcake shops the cutest things ever?  The lovely colors, the tiered platters of pretty cupcakes, the pillowy mountains of frosting, the pink bakery boxes.  Ahhhh.  Such a happy little place.

We headed back to our hotel exhausted, but so happy at all we accomplished on this first day. 

Bear Lake

 We had such a fun weekend in Bear Lake with my family.  My in laws shared their wonderful cabin with us and it was such a great time.  We sure missed my dad who was home working hard getting ready for tax season. 

 

We headed out to sled the golf course as soon as we had unpacked the cars.  The kids had so much fun flying down the hill.  Asher was a bit unsure about why this particular activity was considered fun, but he had fun trying to walk around in the deep snow.  Stella loved sledding, and would throw her hands in the air and shout, "WHEE!" as she cruised down the hill.

 

 

Marcus and the boys played sled derby and would try to push each other off the sleds while careening down the hill.  It was pretty funny to watch and only ended in tears a few times.  

We played games all night, ate lots of treats, and stayed up way too late. On Saturday morning we packed up some lunches and headed to Beaver for a ski day.  Granny was awesome and watched the 2 babes so we could all ski.  It was a beautiful, warm, spring ski day and it was so fun to be together on the slopes.

 

 We finally captured a picture of these 2 cute cousins holding still.  

It was such a fun weekend and so great to have a little weekend getaway!

PLaY

 I love my slow mornings with this one while the other kids are off having school adventures.  She's not one to sit and play for hours at a time, so we hop around from activity to activity in between getting all our jobs done around the house.

When Lola was in the middle of Disney Princess mania, I vowed my next daughter would not be as into princesses. But like it or not, Stella loves her princesses.  She could watch Beauty and the Beast every single day for the rest of her life and be quite content.  She begs to watch you tube videos of all the princess songs.  And she adores her little princess castle she got for Christmas from granny and grandpa.

These are happy times.

tractors

I've been in quite the blogging slump and feeling so behind in so many aspects of my life.  There's always a million things I should be doing in a day and never time to get to even a tenth of them.  Then there's the problem that my babies are growing right up and sometimes even though the to-do list is a mile long, I just want to cuddle Stella on the couch, because I'm going to turn around and she'll be heading out on a big yellow school bus for her first day of kindergarten. 

But I'm trying to break out of the blogging slump.  That's my point in all this.  Because even though I don't think anyone but my sister Chel reads this thing, I feel like keeping this record of our lives is important.  I hope so.

 
There was a morning not too long ago when it struck me again what a good dad my kids have.  They were all awake, frantically getting ready for school, wolfing down bowls of oatmeal, gathering coats, backpacks, homework, reading books, brushing teeth and ready to say their goodbyes.  Nate grabbed Miles and told him he had an adventure to take him on.  Today was the first day of the Pinecrest Shopping Center demolition and if they hurried, maybe Miles could watch the beginning of it.  This tractor lovin kid of mine lit right up.  A few hours later I saw this picture on instagram and I couldn't even imagine his excitement at not only being able to see it, but to actually take part in the destruction!  He headed back to school after a hot chocolate and cinnamon roll break a couple hours late.  I don't think this adventure is something Miles will soon forget and I'm so glad his dad realized that it was more important to spend time with this little guy than to make it to school on time. 

Princesses

My little lady had a princess party on Saturday.

I realized as I was getting her ready that it had been a while since she'd gotten all dressed up princess style.  There was a time when she spent most of the day, every day in princess attire...when had those days ended?  So, we spent a little extra time curling her hair, letting her put on make-up, painting her fingernails, and finding the perfect dress.  Because sometimes I need to remember all the lasts, not just the firsts, in these little lives.

Santa and Sandy Hook

 

The day of the Sandy Hook shooting I was feeling so uneasy.  My heart was broken for those parents who weren't going to be welcoming their little ones home from school that day.  The Christmas presents that were surely bought, wrapped and sitting under the tree would remain unopened.  I couldn't imagine sending my kids off to school in the morning and not having them come home.  I could hardly wait until the school bell rang to go pick them up and hug them extra tight.  We went straight to the mall to visit Santa.

I look at those sweet faces, full of Christmas anticipation, full of innocence and I can't imagine something happening to them.  At this point, they knew nothing of the horrible events of the day and I wanted more than anything to protect them from the knowledge of the pure evil that existed in their world.  I wasn't ready to tell them what happened.  I didn't have the words to explain to them why things like this occur.  I desperately wanted to keep them safe, physically and emotionally but I knew that they would need to know soon and I wanted them to hear it from me and their dad.

But that could all wait a couple days, right?  For this day, we just embraced the magic of Santa Claus.  We smiled, laughed, and let Stella run through the mall without a stroller.  We didn't hurry home for naps, friends, chores, homework or piano.  We went to Paradise for a treat and talked about innocent things like Christmas parties at school, friends, our favorite traditions, and wish lists. 

And this mama just held back tears and felt so incredibly blessed to call these safe, healthy babies mine.