Babs' Trip to NYC

At the end of April my mom came to visit us in NYC.  She has been wanting to visit the Big Apple for decades and with Nick and I living there it was the perfect opportunity for her! 

She arrived at Newark airport one evening and Nick and I took the train out to NJ to pick her up.  Although flying into Newark is typically cheaper, it requires taking many modes of transportation to get to and from, you ride the subway to Penn Station and then take a train out to the airport.  On the way back from picking up my mom we ended up taking the train, subway and finally a taxi to get to her hotel in Tribeca! 

Our first day out we decided to take a Greyline Bus tour so she could see the sights of the city and get a comprehensive overview of the layout.  We got a package that had 4 different bus loops and included tickets on the water taxi to Liberty & Ellis Islands, the Empire State Building, and tickets to the South Street Seaport Museum.  We only made it on 2 bus loops, the Uptown & Downtown trips, but it was well worth it.  I would definitely recommend these to anyone visiting, you get the local flavor of the area from your guide and each person has different stories to tell.

The second day we did a lot of walking and went to 2 different yarn shops that were close by.  One was the Lionbrand studio by Union Square & the other was Purl that has a bunch of specialty yarn.  Lionbrand has a weekly newsletter that goes out that my mom and I subscribe to so it was fun for her being able to see the actual studio space that she hears about so often!  Their yarn is mass produced and sold in stores all over the country (and is very economically priced!).  Purl on the other hand is more of a specialty shop that has more exclusive brands that are for the most part more expensive.  We also stopped by Filene's Basement at Union Square and did some shopping!!!  I had never been in this store, but have heard about it for a long time.

The next couple of days were rainy so we stuck close to the hotel.  We did venture out to have brunch with an old friend from California, my best friends oldest sister, Gwen.  We met up in the Meatpacking district at a restaurant called Pastis (which is owned by the same people who do Balthazar). It was so yummy!!!  We got this amazing bread basket that was filled with pastries & bread!!  That fed us breakfast for days!

We had to take in a Broadway show too!  So on Saturday night we did it up right, we all got dressed up, had dinner at a seafood restaurant in the theatre district and went to see the Lion King.  The costumes were amazing and the kids who played Simba and Nala were incredible!!!  Can't believe how inventive the costume designers were at making people look like all of the animals!!! 

On the last full day my mom and I took the boat out to Liberty & Ellis Island.  My grandfather had been carrying around this code to trace back our family that had arrived in the US through Ellis Island so we were hoping to get some more information.  Unfortunately the code is not valid or at least that's what they told us, so we were a little disappointed.  This has however spiked my curiosity and I have been researching like crazy trying to get some more information on my ancestors.  :)

We were sad to see my mom leave, but knew that we would be seeing her soon when we got back to AZ.  So thankful she was able to come out and see NY while we were there!!!