New York City With a 16 Month old

5-15-15 – New York City, NY

When I tell people we went to New York City for a vacation I get a variety of responses; most of which are not “sounds great”   Response 1. Why?  Response 2.  Who did Sydney stay with?  Response 3.  Why?  Response 4. Did you get mugged/ was it dirty / scarry.  Did you brave the subway?  You get the idea.  It seems to be one of those places you either want to see or really do not want anything to do with.  How you can want nothing to do with it, while still never having seen it, is a little  beyond me but to each their own.  It also seems to be a place, very similar to Mexico, that has not been able to shake it’s negative reputations.  Also like Mexico, I’m sure you could find a way to get into some sketchy situations if you tried, or were generally clueless.

 

So yes we went to NYC just because we have never been there.  E always wanted to go and I held out firmly while living in Nevada, but it seemed a reasonable request now that we are in Ohio.  It is a place that we will probably not have an opportunity to get back to for a while (more on that later!)  We like wandering around new places and it just seemed like an adventure.  Even if it was only for 6 days.  And yes we took Sydney, she loved it and learned a lot.

Playground in Central Park

I’ll spare you an account of seeing the standard stuff.  The Statue of Liberty is smaller than you think, 1 World Trade Center is bigger, you’re not an American if the 9/11 memorial doesn’t make you pause and think about that day and how it would have felt to be there that day, Times Square is, well, Times Square.  Central Park is impressive, there are people everywhere and tere are about three trillion places to eat most of which looked good.  Walking across the Brooklyn Bridge is worth doing.  To that account, be prepared to walk.  We did 13 miles one day.

FAO Schwartz was Sydney's favorite.  Yes we now
own that monkey!

1 World Trade Center from St. Paul's Chapel

What's so interesting about this anyway

Looking back at the Brooklyn Bridge and Manhattan 

There are two places on the bull that are shiny because everyone touches
them.  The Nose and the .... E chose the nose to rub.

We even took Syd with us.  Why not, I’m not much of a Broadway show kind of guy, museums are boring and who wants to go out to dinner in New York City.  So that last one was a bit of a bummer, but we did get some great food, just fast and a lot of it was eaten in Central Park or one of the many other parks around town.  I mean we did spend $50 on takout one night for me and E.  So that was pretty fancy. 

Hints. Parking sucks.  We ditched the car immediately where it was stacked up 5 cars high for the week and brought back down when we left.  At $30/Day that seemed ok, remember its NewYork.  The subway is awesome, cheap and pretty easy to use especially if you read and speak English.  Even syd made friends on it.  It may be underground, but don’t be scared just take your time and figure out what train to catch.  No one waits for the cross walk to turn green.  J walking is an art form and if you aren’t doing it, you are obviously a tourist.

Family selfie on the subway.

I could go on forever about the quirky nuances of the city.  But in the end you just need to check it out.  That was one adventure, now on to the next.  See Final Picture for Details!! 

Coming soon, our next adventure!

It's Cold!

2-26-15 - Home

I don't mind the snow! (Hat before Sydney "removed" the puff ball)

It’s cold around here.  This year there hasn’t been any talk of a “Polar Vortex” but that doesn’t change the fact that I saw a -20⁰ on the car temp. gauge the other day.  I guess they just expect us to get used to it, so the seriously cold doesn’t get its own name anymore.  We joke that it’s warmed in many parts of Alaska on any given day.  And to think it’s colder in many Northern parts of the U.S. and then there is Canada…I can only imagine.  What can you do about it?  Just deal with it.  Push the dirty snow aside and carry on.  Try to keep the driveway clear so that when the next snow comes you aren’t totally buried.  Listen to the furnace hum all night and the house make crazy popping noises as it gets colder and colder.  But now that I’m a Clevelander I am not allowed to complain about this stuff, they make you sign away your rights to complain about the weather when you move here.  The cold, gritty, dirty snow, grey skies this stuff doesn’t bother us attitude it what defines Cleveland and its people.  Needless to say, they all still complain about the weather, it’s actually the official past time of residents here.  

The sun came out one day and we went sled riding.  Might as well use that cold white stuff for something.

Day on the slopes

The sun didn’t come out and it snowed, so we went to the rainforest.  That’s a good place for a toddler to roam freely for a while.  Bonus you feel like a good parent because it’s sort of educational.

It looks tropical in here.

Crazy jungle monkeys.  Don't they know it's freezing out there.

The sun didn’t come out and we went to a book store.  Do you know how many things are at eye level for a 1 year old in a bookstore!

Sydney and cute hat after she removed the puff ball

Now it’s time to get on with it and plan our trips for the summer.  Weekends are filling up and we are looking forward to good times!

The Big 1

1-24-15 – Home

I can help with these Dad

It’s a little late, but oh well.  Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.  I figure I now have the ultimate excuse “I’ve got a kid.” You can follow any shortcoming, mistake, delinquency with “but my kid…..” and pretty much get away with it.  Thankfully, I haven’t had to use this excuse much yet.

The life of a child & parent goes fast.  Christmas came and went with all the craziness and fun, travel and family.  The New Year is here and what do you know it’s the end of January and Sydney is now a full year old.  It goes fast.

The Christmas pic with Santa

Birthday #1 Cake

My first cake, yumm!

The little adventures in our life have changed and seem to be somewhat more “normal” than our past adventures, and I’m using that as my excuse for not blogging about our stuff as much.  I have been trying lately to remember to be a tourist in my own city and think about all the odd, silly, mundane if you’re familiar with them things I've taken pictures of and talked about in the past.  To that effect what I am doing now may be seemingly normal to us, but maybe still worth accounting for.  You never know, maybe there’s someone out there who doesn't know much about, or will find it interesting, to know about raising a daughter in Midwestern America.  Don’t worry I will not be recounting stories of poopy diapers and how chaos ensues once your child turns 1.  You can read a million and one accounts of how difficult it is to raise children if you look.  In reality Sydney is really good, our little house isn’t that chaotic, (sometimes it feels like it is for a few hours) we don’t almost forget to pick her up from daycare, and struggle to get grocery shopping done. 

Making beer in the garage with dad

  Yea, it’s a little different from being DINKs, worried mostly about when the next time we will get to the brewpub for tasty beers, but really just different.  Now we buy tasty beers to drink at home and know that any night you could be up a few times and you’ll be awake by 7:00A the next day.  Not bad really, actually sort of fun.

So Happy New Year, keep doing fun and interesting things, I will try, and your stories keep me motivated to do more myself.  Thinking of the people we know, wishing them a good year, and sending some good energy your way.

Walking with mom in Evansville, In