Our New York City trip, day 3!

Here's our Tuesday!!

Tuesday

• Rode subway and walked to Rockefeller plaza
• Went to LEGO store, today show and st. Patrick cathedral
• Went to Macy's
• Rode subway and walked to  Empire State Building, got to go to the 102nd and 80th floors
• Rode subway and walked to Soupman, me broccoli cheese and nate tomato-yum
• Walked to Carnegie Hall
• Walked to FAO Swartz
• Walked through part of central park saw Alice in Wonderland Statue
• Subway to hotel
• Subway & walked to Steak & Shake
• Walked to theater for Wicked
• Saw Wicked
• Walked back through Times Square-m&m store, Disney store,
• Walked back to Hotel

Nate decided to sleep in and not run on Tuesday. I think our Monday had actually worn him out a little!

So after getting going that morning we walked over to the Subway and hitched a ride over to Rockefeller Plaza (no ice skating, but still cool)!

Right there was also a fun LEGO store which we of course had to go in!

We also passed The Today Show (we were not early enough for the taping)

Radio City:

And a statue of Atlas (which was also so in LEGO!)

Then a quick subway ride over to the Empire State Building (and Macy's, which was cool even if N8 didn't think I thought it was cool)! We had a super fancy "executive pass) to the 102nd floor which included all of the workers telling us "don't wait in any lines" multiple times! The Views were amazing!

 

Unfortunately we waited to go to the 600th floor to see Olympus, but they wouldn't let us! (Percy Jackson fan?)

We were hungry at this point and headed over to the famous Soupman for our 2nd Seinfeld experience! No soup for you!!

I got broccoli cheese and N8 got tomato. It was some of the best soup either of us has ever had! The 2 ladies that ordered after us were actually afraid to order, which made the experience even funner!

Once we finished our soup we headed over to FAO Schwarz to check it out. Our kids would have gone crazy in here!

They happened to be having a Peep's promotion that day!

FAO Schwarz happens to be right next to Central Park! So we walked on in and got our first taste of the gigantic park! We headed for the Alice in Wonderland statue.

We were exhausted (or at least I was) but we had much to still look forward to, so another Subway ride and walk back to our hotel to clean up before Wicked!!

We made a quick stop at Steak n' Shake. N8 had an awesome looking burger, fries and shake and I had some fries, which were really good! We might have to keep our eye out for another one of these!

People say Wicked is awesome- well it is- we loved it!

After the show we walked back through Times Square, did some more shopping and walked back to our hotel!

Our New York City trip, day 2...

Here's my Monday list!

Monday:

• It was rainy
• Nate still went out and ran.
• Walk and subway to natural history museum
• Saw gum gum, Roosevelt,  gems, etc
• Rode subway & walked to 9/11 memorial.
• Ate lunch, big salad
• 9/11 memorial
• Rode subway to Staten Island ferry
• Rode ferry and saw Ellis Island & Statue of liberty
• Walked to "bull" at financial district
• Walked to wall street
• Walked to see Brooklyn bridge
• Walked to subway to Chinatown
• Walked to dinner at Lombardi's pizza
• Rode subway to grand central station
• Rode subway to time square
• Walked and took in time square
• Walked to hotel.

Monday started out with a bang! It was raining. We planned on heading over to the Staten Island Ferry right off the bat, but decided it wouldn't be a good idea given the rain. So, we walked over to the Subway, again, and headed to the American Museum of Natural History. My cousin had given us some great advice/tips the night before, the ticket price is only a "recommended" price, not what you actually have to pay!! The listed price is $19 a person, you only have to pay what you feel you can pay, which we chose $5 per person. Sweet deal!!

We knew there were a few key items we needed to check out, the gems & mineral, Easter Island, and Roosevelt! 

We saw many other things as well and while were were there the weather cleared up!

So we hopped back on the Subway and headed to the 9/11 memorial which we had tickets for at 1pm. We made it there with enough time to find a local spot to eat. Both N8 and I got a big salad (this was our first Seinfeld expereince!).

We walked right up to the 9/11 memorial and showed our tickets. There is a lot of construction still and you weave through quite a bit before actually getting to the site. It was peaceful and I'm glad we were able to go.

This tree was the only tree saved after the Twin Towers fell:

The new Freedom Tower:

Then we were off to the Staten Island Ferry (via Subway). We had a little wait, 15 minutes or so which allowed us to call the kids and find a potty!

Then we started our ferry ride (the Staten Island Ferry is free btw!!)

After the Staten Island Ferry we headed toward the financial district and waited in line to see the Bull!

 

After that we walked over to see the Brooklyn Bridge!

Then a subway ride and "stroll" through Chinatown (I felt accosted at every turn and was not a fan) to our dinner in Little Italy at Lombardi's Pizzeria!

After diner we rode the Subway over to Grand Central Station. It was GRAND (like really HUGE!!) and made me think of all of the crime drama's I watch that take place in NYC!!

We took another Subway over and finally got our first taste of Time Sqaure! So many people!!

We people watched and went into shops like the M&M store and Hershey store!

We took our time and walked back to our hotel while we sipped on Jamba Juice and we exhausted (or at least I was!). 

Our New York City trip, day 1...

On Saturday night we stayed in San Francisco since we had a 6am flight to catch. We still had to get up super duper early, but at least we didn't have to drive 2 hours as well! My WONDERFUL sister watching our CRAZY children for us so we could take this trip. We are so very grateful for her willingness and our kids had a BLAST!!

We arrived in NYC on Sunday evening and left on Thursday morning. I will do a blog post for each day (except Thursday, which was just a flying day!) As we traveled home an made some bullet points to help me remember what we did each day we were there. We staying busy the entire time so I was afraid I would forget something, I still probably did!!

Here's Sunday's list:

Sunday:

• Flew out of SAN Francisco super early
• Arrived at JFK about 2:30
• Horrible time getting on air tran
• Rode subway for 1st time to Penn Station
• Walked to hotel (3 hours after arriving at JFK)
• Got 2 slices of pizza and a bottle of water to share or dinner
• Rode subway to see carol and randy
• Walked around cloisters and their apt
• Subway & walk back to hotel
• Got slurpees on our way home

We flew into JFK. We're had a layover there on our way to upstate and thought it wasn't the nicest airport. Our arrival experience didn't change that opinion! We deplaned fine and grabbed our luggage and headed over to catch the Air Train. We found it fairly easily and saw on the posted sign the an Air Train arrives every 4 minutes. One showed up about 5 minutes later but was VERY full. We decided to wait for the next one. About 30 minutes later another one showed up, also VERY full, but we crammed our way in and were off!!

Once we got off the Air Train we had to pay and buy our Metro Card (the Metro is the Subway). This took a bit of figuring out. We had to pay for our Air Train ride, go through the turn-style and then pay for our Metro Card. We wanted 2 7-day unlimited Metro Cards (the are $30 each and we got our $$ worth out of them!). We got one and then started to get the next one only to have N8's credit card not be accepted! It turns out they only let you do 2 transactions at a time per credit card! So once we figured that out and used a different card to get another Metro Card we were off on our first Subway ride!!

So, 3 hours after we landed at JFK we made it to our hotel. This was our first walk of MANY from the Subway to our hotel. It was about a 15-20 minute walk each time we did it. Our hotel room was tiny, but clean. We dropped off our luggage and walked back to the subway to ride up to see my cousin's family. We picked up 2 slices of pizza and a bottle of water on our walk for $2.75!

We met my cousins family at the Cloisters and they showed us around and we visited.

Then we headed over to the apt to see what a real NYC apt looked like!

We were glad we could take the opportunity to see them in NYC since my cousin has been to Ridgecrest the last 2 years to run the Ragnar with N8.

It started sprinkling as we left and walked back to the Subway. Between our way there and back we "got" to see a guy pee on the side of the rode and a rat in the subway. Nothing like a true NYC experience!! We rode back to the station closest to our hotel and walked back our hotel. About 10 minutes later it started raining and we got a flash flood warning on our phone for the night. I had N8 check to make sure the window was shut since the thunder was so loud!

Casey's Graduation!!

Our last day of school was May 30th. The kids got out at 12:20pm and we were driving out of town by 1pm! We were going to start our summer vacation off with a BANG!!  We caravaned up to Vacaville with my dad, so Emma rode with him and Sam the Cat. Other than some road construction and  traffic it was a pretty smooth drive up. We have started listening to audio books while we travel and have been listening to the 39 Clue series. So far, we're really enjoying it.

On Friday we got up and going and headed to the Jelly Belly Factory. Our kids love going there. There's nothing like sugar in the air!

Then we headed to In-and-Out (our 2nd time that trip since that was dinner the night before)!

Then it was home to get Casey ready for her Graduation!!! She is one amazing girl and I am super proud to be her Aunt! She will be heading to BYU in the Fall-Go Cougars!!

On Saturday we headed out to Muir Woods and check out the TALL trees! It was going to be hot that day in Vacaville, so heading toward the coast made for a much cooler option.

After Muir Woods we went over to the Golden Gate bridge and walked part of it. It was SUPER windy and chilly, but clear, so we had good views of the bay.