Wow...
What a trip! We left home e-a-r-l-y Friday
morning and drove about 12 hours to Pennsylvania, picked up a new camera
(mine died somewhere in Virginia), spent a short night with family and
got up even earlier to drive another 3 hours into New York City to make a
9:30am brunch reservation at American Girl Cafe. Well, let's just say
that we were just a tad bit late... Thankfully, the folks at American
Girl were great and rescheduled us for the 11:00am lunch which worked
out perfectly. Now, let me back up a bit and explain just why we were
late! You might initially think the kids held us up... That is a
real possibility...I actually tend to run
at least 5 minutes late
(usually more) everywhere since having children and it is not
especially easy traveling with 3 kids ages 4 and under, BUT it had
nothing to do with them... They were really great travelers the entire
time... We actually have the GPS to blame for this one! I like the
GPS most of the time, BUT when you are in a big city with lots of roads
running both under and over each other, it can get a little (or a lot)
confused! So, we have the GPS to thank for our morning tour of Brooklyn
and Queens! Anyway, even with that little detour, we were only a
couple minutes late, but add in parking and the logistics of getting the
5 of us out of the car, to American Girl Place and up to the 3rd floor,
we didn't have much time left to enjoy brunch so we instead browsed
around a bit, bought L her first Bitty Baby and made it in plenty of
time to check in for lunch.
After lunch, we toured around a bit and
checked in to our hotel. That afternoon we headed over to The Magnolia
Bakery for birthday cupcakes to celebrate L's birthday and
that evening we went out for a delicious dinner with family. The next
morning we headed out to church to hear my sister-in-law preach (She did
such a great job and delivered a wonderful message!). L & M enjoyed their first subway rides. After the church service and a lunch
reception honoring my sister-in-law, we headed over to The American
Museum of Natural History to see the dinosaurs... B was in
heaven... L enjoyed it, too, though she was beyond tired from our
whirlwind trip and conked out as soon as she got in the stroller. M was just happy to drink her bottle among all of the fossils! After our
trip to the museum, we headed back to the hotel to gather our things and
head out of the city. We arrived back in Pennsylvania (after a short
tour of Little India, thanks again to the GPS) Sunday night and back
home late Monday. Phew...what a fast, but FUN, trip!
