Family Trip Day Two: New York City

Not that I did not want to visit NYC, but this was a Josh pick. Being as enormous as New York is, we opted to spend two days there. Luckily for me, one of my best friends (and bridesmaid) lives about 45 minutes from the city and we were able to stay with her for two nights.

So on the first day, we got up very early (still at my sisters) and drove the four hours to New York City. As we were driving along in Connecticut, we see a sign on the road for a dinosaur museum. Of course, we pulled off the freeway to check it out.

Turns out during a large construction project in the 60's, the workers noticed lots of prints in the soil. They called the "officials" who later determined the site to have been heavily travelled by dinos. Now there is a park there. There were not any skeletons, just lots of tracks and some fake dinosaurs. But Levi and Claire still liked it.

We continued our drive to NYC. I had done a very organized (go ahead Cyp, say it: anal) binder of everything. I had driving directions, things to do, maps, airline and car confirmations, etc. So thanks to my organizational skills, we made it into the Bronx perfectly. Now we just had to find a place to park. And the subway. Once that was done we took the subway to the American Museum of Natural History.

In case there are some skeptics out there, I will remind everyone that Levi loves dinosaurs. Loves them. That is why the museum was our first stop. At our museum at the U there are maybe five skeletons. One of them is an Allosaurous. Now, an allosaurous is like a T-Rex, just smaller and apparently not as fierce. Every time we go the the Burke Museum and see the Allosaours, Levi signs "I wish we had a T-Rex".

We decided to see the T-Rex first, but there are SO MANY DINOS, it was kind of overwhelming and intimidating. They had every dinosaur imaginable! Fun.

After an extremely expensive lunch at the museum (over $40), we walked across the street to Central Park. In my planning, I knew that CP was huge, but I apparently did not allot enough time to cover the five things I wanted to see. Oh well. It was a beautiful day and very relaxing. We let the kids wander around and climb rocks, throw rocks, pet dogs... Just like a Seattle day!

The only pshyco-ness that happened that day was right when we got into CP. Levi has been potty trained for awhile. Well, on the plane to Boston, we quickly realized what a blessing a pull-up would have been on that flight. So we decided, since we were in the car for millions of hours, in a museum for millions of hours and basically wanted to be lazy parents, we put Levi in a pull-up for the trip to New York.

All was fine, until he had to poop. I have never seen him so upset. We were in the middle of Central Park, where if there even was a bathroom, I would not have used it. He was screaming because he did not want to go poop in his pull-up. I can only imagine what the people passing us were thinking.

But if that was the worst for that day, then that was not so bad.

So after the park we took the subway to Yankee Stadium where Josh left us and met up with a friend to catch a Yankee game. I was left with Claire asleep on my back, Levi asleep in the stroller and a large backpack. In the Bronx. I had to carry the stroller with Levi in it up the three flights of stairs to get to street level and find our car in the parking garage. Then I drove my kids and I to my friend Lis's where a scrumptious dinner of tacos was awaiting. Yum.