New York New York aka... really long post

I'm not even sure how to summarize our time in New York.  It was a perfect adventure for our little family.  We got to do so many tourist things that we haven't had time for in the past and also got a little bit of a feel for living in the big city.  Our apartment was in the financial district downtown.  At first, I was hoping that we'd be closer to Central Park but I LOVED where we lived.  It is so beautiful and peaceful along the river and it was nice because there weren't many tourists around.  

I put all of my pictures on my computer when starting this post and there were over 800 from the time we were there so I just had to pick a few favorites.

We, especially Noah and I, spent a lot of time playing by the river, looking at the statue of liberty, boats, airplanes, chasing birds, watching people, and letting Noah run all over the place. 

Jon actually didn't work in Manhattan but right across the river in Jersey City.  We were lucky that they still put us up in the city.  The biggest building to the left is Goldman Sachs where Jon worked.

We rode the subway everywhere.  Noah loved the trains.  Getting from place to place with a family would be one of the biggest challenges of living in the city.  I really don't know how I could have done it with more than one child.  I carried the stroller up and down the stairs (which was especially heavy if we had gone shopping or had groceries in the stroller!)

I had to take a picture of this staircase that I had to carry Noah down because it was so long.  Most of the time there were just a lot of short staircases but this one was a subway going to Brooklyn under the river so they just kept going and going.  It wasn't nearly as bad before it started getting hot but once the weather warmed up I always felt like a sweaty mess by the time we got to the train.

We got to go to a lot of museums... The MET, the American Museum of Natural History, the Guggenheim, and the Children's Museum

The new 9/11 Memorial was amazing.  No picture that I have seen has shown how awesome it is.  We lived just a few minutes from there and when you looked out the left side of our balcony we had a great view of the new Freedom Tower.  It was really humbling to walk back to our apartment everyday and look up at that big building, knowing that the towers stood right there, that someone was walking where I was when they came down.  I can't imagine how terrifying that was.

Craig came to visit and we had a great time.  Unfortunately, it was our coldest week there and none of us really came prepared for that cold of weather.  We stuck it out and still rode on the top of the bus tour for as long as we could bear.

Top of the Rock

Rockefeller Center

Sara is living in DC and came down for the weekend.  We packed in a ton of stuff and had a great time!

Dylan's Candy Bar

Serendipity Frozen Hot Chocolate (we got the regular and peanut butter, the peanut butter was hands down the winner.  It was to die for!)

Highline Park

Alice and Wonderland in Central Park

Chelsea Market

The Bronx Zoo

Yankee's Game

Playing in the rain, it rained sooooo much while we were there!

Jane's Carousel....so charming

FAO Schwartz... Noah loved the BIG Piano and playing with the trains

Hanging out on our rooftop, the views were amazing

Statue of Liberty

Ellis Island

Got to see Sarah!  So fun even though it was short!

Manhattan Temple

One thing I'm not sure that I'll ever get to do again is spend hours wandering Central Park.  There is so much to see and Noah and I barely scratched the surface of it but it was so fun.

Other things we did but aren't pictured.... walked across the Brooklyn Bridge, ate so much pizza, shopped, rode the Staten Island Ferry, ate at The Donut Plant, Magnolia Bakery, Bryant Park, Times Square, The Children's Library (that has the original Winnie the Pooh stuffed animals in it), playgrounds, storytime, I'm sure there is so much more that I am missing.  It was a great experience but we were so excited to come back.  There really is no place like home!