Family Visit Day 3

Saturday was definitely the craziest day of the trip. My family really wanted to see New York City, and we figured since Saturday was the day that Jeff would be off; that was the day we’d head to NYC.(Waiting for the Staten Island Ferry)

We got off a little later than expected, but still made pretty good time. The ride up was a little squishy, but we managed and had a pretty fun time with everyone all together. We figured that rather than park in the city, we’d just drive to Staten Island and take the ferry across to Manhattan. (On the Staten Island Ferry)

The ferry was great, the boys loved being on such a big boat and it was nice to sit back and enjoy the ride. We got a great view of the Statue of Liberty and the city skyline as we were coming in. It was another busy day in NYC, and we had a good time doing some sight-seeing around the city. (Sweet boys at the end of the night)

We did a ton of walking and I just have to say how great our little boys are. We had Matthew in the stroller, but Caleb and Jacob walked almost the entire way and we never heard even one complaint. There’s so much to see and not even close to enough time to see everything, but we got to see a lot and had a great time. We got to see Wall Street and the NY Stock Exchange, we saw the Twin Towers memorial, the Empire State Building, Broadway, Chinatown, Times Square, and a bunch of other things. Of course we found time to stop and do a little shopping with some of the street vendors. Actually we only spent about 25 minutes, we were pretty busy with other things-well, either that or the men in the group didn’t appreciate the great deals on all the purses. We found the best deals in the Chinatown; Dad got a new pair of medicine balls. Lacey & Mom found a couple purses they really liked. Cole picked up a few miscellaneous things and I finally decided to get a couple necklaces. I’m more of a 1-purse kind of girl; I’ve had the same one for almost 6 years. It was funny though, seeing all those purses almost convinced me to buy another one….almost. There was a cute white one that I really liked, then I started to think about when I would actually use it and how it would stand up to my boys, and I figured my well-loved purse and diaper bag serve just fine. Oh well, maybe next time we’re in New York I’ll break down and get one. If anything, it was fun to watch the reactions of the Chinese girls while we were looking at their purses- they thought Matthew was adorable and were laughing at him pulling on Jeff’s ears. Of course everyone also had to pick up some I (heart) NY shirts, and I’m sure we looked like typical NYC tourists with our shirts, purses, and bags.

For lunch we couldn’t make up our minds what everyone wanted. We finally decided that we’d stop in Chinatown and started looking around for a place. There was this awesome little Chinese guy that told us where we could get good, cheap food and even took us over a couple blocks to it. It was a big buffet style place where you got a big tray and a choice of 5 entrees and soup, all for $4.50. We ordered only a few to share, and even that was too much to finish. I think we enjoyed having a place to sit and rest for a while more than anything.

(The good subway ride)

We took the subway from Chinatown up to see the Empire State Building, Broadway, and Times Square. At this point it was starting to get dark and we knew that the last subway to the Staten Island Ferry left at 8:50, so we didn’t have a lot of time in Times Square, but it was enough for us.

I still have a hard time talking -or even thinking about the last part of our trip. (No pictures of this part) Like I said before, we were going to take the subway back down to the ferry. First of all, our dumb metro cards were having issues so a few of us had to double up through the gates because there wasn’t enough money on the cards (we bought enough rides, but sometimes the card didn’t work, then it would deduct fares) Secondly, somehow we didn’t know when getting onto the subway that in order to be let off at the Staten Island Ferry stop, you have to be in the first five cars of the subway. To make a long story short, we were NOT in one of the first five cars; in fact, we were pretty much near the back, and the cars weren’t labeled, so you wouldn’t have even known . So the rest of the story involves jumping off our car at the stops and attempting to madly dash to the next one in less than 10 seconds, all while hauling luggage and three children. Many of us(Dad, Jeff, Me & Matthew) were slammed in doors and almost left behind. We became experts at prying open the doors to save the endangered victim. After too many bouts of that, we took the prohibited, unlawful route and would go up through the center doors between the cars. We did this as long as we could, until there were no more doors. Finally there was just one more stop and we had about 2 cars to go. We met a very friendly & helpful young man who was from Staten Island who reassured us that we would be okay, and he would stall the subway (by holding the doors open) to help us make it up to the necessary car. So we made one more mad dash (only Jeff was shut in the door on this one) and finally made it to the darn Staten Island Ferry stop. Yes, now you see why this is still painful to talk or even think about. It’s the black cloud of the trip and I’m still looking forward to the day when I can look back and laugh about it…not for a while yet.

(Trying to appear happy as we show off our Subway 'battle' wounds. These are some of the marks left by the doors. I had some pretty good bruises the next day too.)

Anyway, we made it and after a 30 minute wait for the ferry, we were so happy to see the boat. It was a nice, Uneventful, ride back. It was beautiful to see the buildings all lit up. (And yes, I was waving a happy goodbye at this point) We made it back to the car, and headed home. Somehow we ended up missing a turn-off, so our ride home ended up being about an extra hour & a half. But hey, who’s counting when you get home at 2am anyway. Plus, we were together and that’s all that mattered!

Even though we had a few rough times (bonding moments) on the trip, all in all, we had a really fun time in New York.. We did come back with some fun souvenirs, and some long-lasting memories. I was sure grateful to have Jeff with us, I couldn’t have done it without him.