New York, Take 2

Hey everyone! Please forgive our unintended hiatus from the blogosphere, it's been a bit feast or famine around here lately in terms of time to post. I'm going to hit you with a series of posts today so you can see what we've been up to.

Most of these are quick, 5-6 hour trips to New York City. We're 45 minutes from the city by train, which has worked out really well since Christie normally only has one day off at a time. So we've made several of those which has allowed us to break up the sight seeing into small chunks. I think it's been more enjoyable for the kids that way as well.

There are obviously a few things that we missed - we'd love to go to the Museum of Natural History, the New York Public Library, The U.S. Customs House, the United Nations building, and Wall Street. But the biggies for us were Central Park, the WTC Memorial, and the Statue of Liberty.
For this trip, I didn't call early enough for Statue tickets, so we decided to take a cab from Grand Central to the corner of Central Park and see what happened.

First discovery: The Central Park Zoo

Relatively small zoo, but totally worth it for the Polar Bear. The only other story to tell is of my on-going altercation with a balloon salesman which will be hereafter referred to as The Great Balloon Controversy of 2012. It involved thrusting of lightsaber balloons into the hands of unsuspecting children, charging their parents $2 a piece, and being told two minutes later they could not bring the balloons into the zoo ten steps away. This resulted in Richard's first and last "don't take anything from anyone" lesson in New York and an attention grabbing shouting match between myself and the salesman every time we saw him later that day, me yelling, "YOU OWE ME FOUR DOLLARS!! THIS GUY'S A THIEF!!" to which he would aptly respond in some obscure Semitic language, "boop boop boop boop boop," which I can only assume means, "Ha ha, stupid white man, I shall go home and tell my children how I outsmarted you on this day." Colorful, and much more engaging than the story I will tell you in a few posts about how I almost punched Elmo in his big stupid face. Wait for it.

We ate gyros and hotdogs from a street vendor (NY vendor gyros RULE) and took a bike tour to all the cool spots in the park. This was a reflecting pool where you can rent radio controlled, miniature sailboats (which we did on a subsequent visit). I should be clear - we did not ourselves ride bikes through the park, we just rode in a carriage pulled by a tour guide on a bike. When he stopped here, he kept saying "Alice" but it was obvious he didn't know much more about it than that. At the end of the pool we were treated to a statue of Alice, the Mad Hatter and March Hare, and Cheshire Cat. "Curiouser and curiouser!" I exclaimed (okay, I wish I would have). A pleasant surprise, as I am quite the Lewis Carrol fan and had just read some parts of Through the Looking Glass to the boys earlier in the week.

This is the cover illustration for the George DeLacorte version of Alice, Through
The Looking Glass - my favorite edition. He commissioned the statue for his wife in  1959.
Had no idea this was here. 

The thing I love about Central Park is how serene it is (at least on
weekdays) but you can still feel the city in the background. 

Hans Christian Anderson

Next stop, Strawberry Fields. I have to say this was a bit of a pilgrimage for me. I grew up with some awareness of The Beatles music, but it wasn't until I was about 35 that I really "heard" them properly for the first time and realized how pale all my favorite music was by comparison. Since then, I count them as my favorite band, and Lennon my favorite songwriter. I've not just become a Beatles fan. I'm the kind of Beatles fan that can tell you the name of the drummer who replaced Ringo for one gig when he had his tonsils out. And what songs they played that night.

This was Lennon's favorite place in Central Park when he lived across the street in the Dakota building. He was a stay at home dad and loved to push baby Sean through this part of the park on nice days. After he was killed, his ashes were scattered here.

The last picture is me and a guy named Gary de LaBron. He is the self-appointed mayor of Strawberry Fields, responsible for the flower arrangements in all the pictures. He's been coming here nearly every day since the memorial was established, and has been featured in several documentaries about Lennon's legacy. He is technically loitering and panhandling, both against the law, but he has so endeared himself to Guliani, Mayor Bloomburg, and Yoko Ono, that they consider him a fixture of Strawberry Fields, and he's become a bit of a celebrity in his own right. I was looking out for him that day and was glad to catch him there. He's pretty wacky - believes the government had Lennon killed, thinks they're out to kill him, etc. Just feels like another part of the crazy story that was and is the life of John Lennon. Icing on the cake for my first visit to pay homage to John and the comfort I've found in his songs.

We got back fairly early this day because Christie had to work early the next morning.

Oops

I was supposed to post this a few months ago - just found it again.

Piano is a bit hit and miss for us, but the boys are learning basics like chord positions and notation.

Flex

Ah, the essence of homeschooling - flexibility. I hate being flexible - I'm a schedule, routine oriented person  - if I want spontaneity, I plan a block of time for it. Homeschooling and travelling is not conducive to such thinking, and it's slowly getting pounded out of me. Connecticut has presented us with changes to our routine and I think I've had the hardest time adapting. Don't get me wrong - we really like Norwalk a lot, and Connecticut in general, but this is the first time in many years that we've had to completely re-arrange our lives around a different work schedule. It's changed how and when we do our "schoolwork" a little bit, and forced us to scale down the scope of our out-of-town trips and explorations. It can be frustrating at times, but it's teaching us flexibility. We're a bit spoiled with big blocks of free time, but we've purposely set up our lives to make it that way. I get cranky when our routine is disrupted, but it's forcing us to find creative ways to have as much family time as possible in between Christie's bizarre work schedule. That can't be bad.

Christie typically has 1 - 1.5 days off at at time, so rather than say, a three day trip to New York, we have to only plan enough for a single day. This week it rained on the day we planned an excursion, so we went with something more simple. To be honest, it was a nice break from trains, taxis, rails, and crowds. We found a little sports complex over near New Haven, and because we went on a Tuesday, we were practically the only ones there. Bowling, mini-golf, arcade games, lunch at Red Robin, some shopping in the mall...it was a nice change of pace from museums and apartment hunting. We got a little wet during golf, but it made for a memorable day.

Sometimes you just need a big juicy hamburger.
Red Robin is the go to place. 

The boys are also playing soccer, so Saturday mornings are currently filled up with that.

We've got a quasi-tradition of eating pizza at a delicious "organic" pizza place called Savor nearby after soccer. We didn't know it was organic when we first ate there, but the pizza is so incredible we keep going back. 

The boys prefer meat-lovers

Mom tried a Mediterranean pizza with Avacado and Cucumber Sauce 

Yesterday, Christie took the boys to a park to give dad some down-time and let them run off a little more energy since they've been cooped up here most of the week with the rain. 

After which they came home and made toffee cookies. 

So life is going on, summer is coming. I know some of you follow the blog for actual homeschooling reasons (not that all this stuff isn't homeschooling), but I'll do a post soon on what's been happening with the boy's academic progress, plans for summer, etc. 

Start Spreadin' The News...I'm Leavin' Today...

I want to be a part of it...

Ah, how I love Frank. 

This was the first time Christie and the boys have been to the Big Apple, though it's been nearly 20 years since I went. What an incredible weekend. I'll start at the beginning. 

I think I've mentioned (about a hundred times) that we're tying to get used to Christie working day shift because we're a bit trapped at home without the van. We're making the most of it, but our friends, the Foleys, could tell we were in a bit of a funk last week. They surprised us by offering to meet us halfway between our house and theirs Thursday night to take me and the boys back to PA with them. This was perfect since we we were all planning to go to NYC Friday night/Saturday when Christie was off. We met at an Indian place in Bethlehem, PA and pigged out on Lamb Vindaloo and a bunch of other awesome stuff I can't pronounce. 

We spent most of the day Friday at the park. We LOVE this Homeschool group (INCH). We've not had a connection like this with any other group in our travels, and we keep going back there as often as possible. A huge group of kids that mix together so well regardless of age.

The best part about these kids is that no one instructs them how to
play or to play with each other. They make up games, mix age groups,
and come up with some pretty creative twists on popular games. 

Red Rover - notice how small Brennan is compared to the older kids?

That night we went to the Lancaster Barnstormers baseball game. This is becoming a tradition, since we went last year too when we lived in PA. It was a bit sad because Christie wasn't there, but great to hang out and see all the kids playing together. Cool firework show afterwards too.

Amy Madsen and Stacy Foley

Not sure if the kids are praying or playing Assassins here. Either way... 

Brennan watches fireworks

Rich watching fireworks

The next morning we headed back to CT together where Christie was ready and waiting to board the train for NYC. We caught the train from Stamford Metro Station, about 10 minutes from here. Nice!

On the train

Straight into Grand Central Station. It is Grand. It is Central. And it is a Station. I think you could spend an entire day just wandering around it.

We walked a few blocks to the Empire State Building, failed to outsmart a huckster out front, but eventually made it to the observation deck. It's definitely odd looking out at the skyline and not seeing the World Trade Center, but the Freedom Tower is about halfway built, and the boys could see Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty in the distance. 

I love the moment here where Rich sees the Statue of Liberty a few minutes in.

From there, we took a bona-fide New York cab (replete with near collisions, passing in the wrong lane, horn honking, cursing, and regretting not updating our will) to Greenwich Village to eat at a local dive called John's Pizzeria. Purportedly the favorite of local celebrities, but very un-fancy. Regardless, the pizza and calzones were worth the trip, although the Village turned out to be my favorite part of the city. It reminded me of The Cosby Show and Friends. 

Speaking of which, all the adults in the group are HUGE Friends nerds - constantly quoting the show, looking up trivia, etc. So we walked a few blocks to the building they used for the transition shots, then the theater where most of Joey's plays are assumed to take place. Geeky, but it was a bit of a thrill to see them.  

We also hit a little cupcake shop called Magnolia Bakery around the corner. Delicious, line out the door, stifling inside. We chowed down at a quaint and picturesque little Village park across the street before heading back downtown. 

                                     

From there, another cab ride to Times Square, where though it was night, it looked like broad daylight. Really hard to know where to look first. We were getting tight on time, and the kids were dying to check out the massive Toys R Us with the Ferris wheel inside, so we quickly ran in and did that (TOURIST TRAP). Next time we may just spend the whole day in Times Square - so much to see. 

Stacy's life passing before her eyes

Note the Bubba Gump Shrimp Company in the background

It was a bit of a walk back to Grand Central, but we made it in time to catch a late train home. Exhausted, but it was an unforgetable day, and we feel so fortunate to have shared it with close friends. Next morning the Dad's made the Mom's brunch and hung out at the apartment until the Foley's had to head back. Then we took mom out for sushi for Mother's Day. A whirlwind weekend for sure.