Valentines Fun

This year we made our valentines ourselves. I think they turned out cute. The boys had a great time making them too. They picked out the color glitter-paper and glued it all together. They chose a plastic animal for each person specifically. My favorite part was their cute little finger holding the string knot on the back so I could tie it tight.

Andrew thoroughly enjoyed handing out his valentines to his class mates. This was his first year to have a real class Valentines party. He thought it was awesome!

Andrew came with me to help volunteer at Jacob's class for his party, Andrew was so helpful. Here he is holding Jacob's Valentine bag. He helped a bunch of other kids hold their bags too. Jacob's class played a cute game and made a fun snack. It was a fun day for a party. --emily

Birthday cake

For my birthday Miss Abby and Miss Nathalie made me this beautiful giant cake! Thank you girls for being so thoughtful. You are so amazing. Love, Sister Siple

Fire Station Fun

Andrew's pre-school had a fire station tour and safety class on Friday. Because Jacob has school only every other Friday he joined us and both boys had a super fun time together.

During our station tour there was an emergency call and a firetruck went out to respond to it. What a fun experience for the kids to see everything in action. -- emily

Why I (heart) NYC

Lunch at Serendipity: They are famous for their frozen hot chocolate. Kelly and I each had a BLT and a frozen hot chocolate. It absolutely lived up to all the hype. All our food was so yummy! I wish I was eating that for dinner right now! Yummm . . .

The Love Sign: This was on my list of things to sees in NYC. It happened to be right across from our hotel!

Dylan's Candy Bar: Dylan is the daughter of Ralph Lauren she has this darling candy shop in a great part of town. We ate some yummy candy and still have a bucket to prove it. Thanks for the recommendation Kate!

I love that in NYC a stop light is only a suggestion to drivers.

I love that in NYC a 3 lanes road can be a 4. All our taxi drivers would drive between lanes while honking.

I love that in NYC people are so amazingly friendly. We had free drinks brought to our table in one restaurant. An old man offered to buy me diamonds! No really . . .

I love that in NYC everything is only a walk away.

I love that in NYC a pedestrian walk sign is optional. Look both ways and walk.

I love that in NYC on trash day there are heaps of garbage on the side walk and then like magic it is all picked up by the end of the day.

I love that in NYC the meat trucks come out at 11:00 pm.

I love that in NYC the town really never sleeps. Everything is always open.

I love that in NYC there are hundreds of amazing restaurants to eat in. We ate out almost every meal and we weren't disappointed once.

--emily

Central Park & Time Square

Wednesday was the first day that we were both able to venture out together in the daylight, so we decided to walk up to Central Park.

Emily had seen pictures of this bridge before, so we wanted to find it and see it in person. There are actually several beautiful bridges in Central Park. It's fun that they have this big, beautiful park right in the middle of the big city. We were impressed with how much was there--a lake, pond, zoo, ice-skating rink, stage, and wide open fields.

After walking through most of the park, it started getting dark, so we decided to head back to Time Square.
Time Square is kind of sensory overload. It was fun to just sit and watch the lights.

Emily's shoes had gotten wet at Central Park when we tried to hike up around a waterfall, so we tried to find some flip-flops she could change into. We tried several different stores around Time Square, but no one was selling flip flops. I guess they were out of season.

It was a great evening and a fun way to spend our last night in New York. --Kelly

Fashion District

On Tuesday January 31st & Wednesday February 1st while Kelly was in his conference sessions, I walked the fashion district. The first day I stopped at the NYC public library. The library has a museum on the bottom floor that I walked through and enjoyed what there was to see. I brought Kelly back on Thursday to see the outside of the library. He has fond memories of it as the opening scene from Ghostbusters.

On the back-side of the library is Bryant park. It was such a fun park. There were boccie games, ping-pong and horse shoes all being played. There is a game house to get the game supplies from. You just have to sign them out no charge. Totally cool! It was the perfect day to be in the park. The group of men below all moved over from Itally over 50 years together. They are all retired and get together everyday to cute.

I also ate lunch in Bryant park. They have little sandwich shops throught the park. I picked 'wichCraft to order my food from. I was not disappointed. The food was great and the weather was awesome. In talking with some local people, the weather was out of the ordinary for this time of year. It was in the high 60's all week. I am so thankful because it sure made walking around lots of fun.

Kelly and I have watched lots of "Project Runway" episodes, so I wanted to make sure to check out Mood. Bryant park is also were they do their finale fashion show during fashion week. I was in heaven! Mood is a giant 3 story fabric store filled with amazing fabrics and notions. I spent many hours shopping! Mood was one of many fabric / notion stores I spent hours in. Since we have been home I have placed a few on-line orders also. Amazing fabric. I wish we had something like this here in Seattle. Kelly is probably glad we don't!

M & J Trimming was an all notions store. It was amazing! Not just rows and rows but walls filled with ribbon, buttons, zippers, clasps, feathers, so many little teeny things for that project I didn't know I had to do. Again I was in heaven like so many days this week!

As I walked further into town I fell more and more in love with the city. I can't wait to go again. There is still so much to see! --emily

NYC Temple

And in the middle of it all there is a Mormon temple. Super cool!

Wicked

Tuesday January 31st Kelly took me to see Wicked for my birthday. It was amazing! I now get why Broadway shows are such a big deal. They are the best of the best. The best actors with amazing singing abilities. The makeup is out of this world. The set was to die for. Kelly, thanks for the greatest birthday yet! --emily

Kelly Rippa

Monday morning January 30th I had tickets to see "Live with Kelly Rippa". It is filmed in the ABC building a little jaunt from out hotel. It was a fun experience. Kelly is funny and interacts well with the crowd. Her co-host was ABC news correspondent Dan Abrams and her guest actor was Channing Tatum. Channing was so nice! There was a girl about 15 years old in the audience, her mom let here skip school for the day because her favorite actor in the world is Channing and it was her birthday. Channing took the time to chat with her and wish her a happy birthday. She was in heaven. Two thumbs up for Channing for being real and making a little girl's world. --emily

9 / 11

Sunday morning January 29th we took a taxi and ventured to the southern part of Manhattan island with a list of must sees in hand.

Kelly was interested in exploring the NY financial district. We checked out the Stock Exchange, the Federal building, and the Charging Bull.

We thought a good Sunday activity would be to see the 9 / 11 memorial. So we planned accordingly and got tickets in advance.

New York is an amazing place with tall buildings packed in on each city block unlike any city I have ever been to before. The memorial has been built down instead of up. This is a contrast to the rest of the city. The memorial is built on the footprint of the twin towers. It's now a wide open space set aside for family, friends, neighbors, sisters, brothers, fathers, and mothers for people who have loved and lost. For people who's lives are changed forever. A place to pause and take a moment to reflect.

The names of all of the victims were machine cut into the metal of the memorial. There were several names followed by "and her unborn child" as seen above. This was emotional to see. Being at ground zero was a humbling experience. We have so much to be grateful for.

This sculpture was in between the two towers when they went down. They pulled it out of the rubble with not much damage. The piece was abstract art to begin with. It is now on display in Battery Park with an eternal flame.

After taking our time in the 9 /11 memorial and museum, we jumped onto a boat for a tour around Manhattan.

We saw Lady Liberty!

This photo is the south end of the island skyline. The buildings still under construction were buildings damaged in 9 /11 and are still being repaired. Lots of damage was done to this pore city!

The Brooklyn bridge.

Empire state building. The worlds first building to be made of steal.

Cool old sugar refinery on the other side of the river.

This photo is mid left side of the island. The two small buildings in the foreground almost perfect center are the buildings that the twin towers were modeled after. In a much larger scale of course.

It was a great first day in the Big Apple. --emily