A Day in the life...: A weekend to remember.

Whew. We're home. And exhausted. But- the exhaustion we feel now was well worth it.

Let me tell you about out trip.

We were a bit delayed (about an hour or so) getting into NYC on Friday b/c the airport was backed up- go figure. And USAir bumped one of us out of First Class b/c Todd can only take one person w/ him. Sooo- Jack and I rode in F.C. on the way up and Todd and his Dad rode F.C. on the way home today.

We made it into the city, dropped our luggage off at the hotel and headed out to Stage Deli for some GINORMOUS sandwiches. Which, by the way, had some GINORMOUS price tags to go along with it.

Our hotel, the Sheraton New York, was on 7th Ave and 53rd Street. We could walk to Times Square, Central Park, Rockefeller Center and Broadway. It was definitely a prime location. Although we walked most places, Todd carried Jack on his shoulders quite a bit. A four - soon to be five - year old can't quite navigate the city on foot. Plus there were gobs of people that would have walked right over him had we let him hoof it.

After lunch on Friday we headed toward Rockafeller Center and F.A.O. Schwartz. Talk about excited. Jack's eyes lit up as soon as we walked into the famous toy store. Of course he wanted to go straight for the cars and trucks. We steered him toward the Legos but to no avail. He picked out an NYPD tow truck and police car package. It's pretty cool. Gammy signed Jack up to 'make his own Hotwheel.' He was able to design his own car on the computer and moments later a brand new Hotwheel 'miraculously' shot out of this machine with a handy dandy certificate. All for the bargain price of $22.00. I picked out a Penelope Peapod baby for Riley and an outfit for the baby and we were done with the first toy store of our trip. More on number two later.

We decided to take a carriage ride around Central Park. It's actually a 20 minute ride through the edge, but it was still pretty neat. Jack seemed to like it and we passed by this super cool rock that Todd and Jack climbed once we were done w/ our ride.

We walked over to look around at Rockefeller Center when Gammy and I saw the American Girl store. Lucky for Riley - Gammy had the bright idea that we should stop in there to look for a birthday present for RiRi. Well- she racked up. I did the majority of my birthday shopping for her, as did Gammy. We ended up getting her the Bitty Baby version of American Girl- the newborns. They are super cute and we got her all kinds of goodies to go w/ it. She'll love it.

For dinner Friday night we went to Chez Josephine's in the theater district. Todd's dad grew up (or vacationed by) the owner or something of that nature. We've been in there before and they have the most fabulous pasta bolognese (sp). Jack didn't eat much b/c his tummy hurt - shocker since he won't take care of business in public places- but the rest of us had a nice dinner.

That was it for Friday. Now on to the big day.

Breakfast is an entire other blog- I'll write more about that tomorrow or Tuesday. It's a ridiculous story.

After breakfast we had some time to kill before taking the subway to Yankee Stadium so we walked over to Times Square to go to Toys R Us. It didn't open until 10:00 and it was only 9:15. You got it- Jack was disappointed. We promised to take him after dinner and he was ok with that.

Disclaimer

Yes- Jack was spoiled rotten beyond belief this weekend- I am fully aware of that and fully aware that he will go through new toy withdrawl this week. Am I looking forward to this? No. But. It was a special weekend.... I know...I know....

Instead of Toys R Us we hit the Hershey's Store and the M and M Store. They were definitely interesting and we had fun looking at all the goodies.

We went back to the hotel to lounge for a few minutes and then Jack took on his first subway ride to Yankee Stadium. He thought it was pretty cool. We visited the memorabilia store and got the kids some T-shirts before heading into the game. As soon as we walked into the stadium Jack said, "Wow." That's it. Just "Wow."

What an experience for him. He is just beginning to play baseball and he was quite mesmerized for a while, until the heat caught up to him. It was in the mid 90's- seems we brought the Charlotte heat w/ us- and we were all hurting. Steve was able to score us incredible seats- behind homeplate in the 1st base line- so we ended up being in the shade once the game started but it was still HOT.

We stayed until the end of the fifth inning- which was a feat in itself considering it was a super slow game and it was so hot. Plus we got there early so we were all ready to go and grab a shower and quick nap before heading out for dinner.

We walked back over to Times Square for dinner and went to John's Pizza. It came recommended as a great place to get NY pizza. It was yummy. We topped it off w/ some ice cream after our last trip to the toy store.

This time it was Toys R Us. This one is three stories high w/ a ferris wheel smack dab in the middle of it. Unbelievable. We were able to persuade Jack to get some Legos- not sure how we did that.

And that was about it.

We flew home today, unpacked, grocery shopped, did laundry, ate dinner and here we are- about to go to bed.

I'll write about our breakfast soon.

Here's some pics.

Jack's all ready for his first plane ride in 2 1/2 years- and those he can't remember so it's like doing it for the first time. First class too!