New York City, New York

This past weekend we went to visit Clay's brother, Uncle Todd, & his girlfriend, Sedona, in Manhattan and Aunt Noelle who came in from Boston for all the fun. For Christmas this year,Todd gave us two night's stay at a hotel in New York which we cashed in this weekend. I can't remember exactly what we gave Todd but I believe it was several items, probably all from Marshalls, and one of them was a tie. I assume we've used up the Christmas present bank with this whopper and won't ever expect any gifts ever again.

Upon arriving in New York we took a cab, James' first experience with this, to our fancy hotel. Here, Clay explains to James the ins and outs of not getting ripped off by your cab driver in a big city.

That's right James, there are some bad people out there and, yes, it is hard to believe. This is James' latest new face by the way. James passed the time by kissing that map of New York in front of him. Cute kid.

When we arrived, we met Aunt Noelle who took us on a walking tour to the nearest attractions. Here we have Grand Central Station. Knowing that Aunt Noelle had been involved with a sorority, James felt she might be most comfortable with the old 'lean-in sorority' pose. We had to explain to him later that she's not your typical sorority girl and also it's not very PC to stereotype people like that, although often a safe bet.

Then to Saint Patrick's Cathedral. The church was very beautiful and it reminded me of Notre Dame on the inside. This is also a famous place, everyone.

And then we got to see Uncle Todd and Serious Girlfriend Sedona after they were done with work.
Gee, Uncle Todd, that's a long title. I just wish there was something shorter we could call her.

James threw a wild party in our hotel room.

Saturday

Taking the double decker bus tour around Manhattan was a great idea! We got to see all the sights, and here are some photos of us seeing them.

One of my favorite stops was Times Square! It was absolutely overwhelming and I could have spent a long time looking around. However, after we returned home and I was looking at my photos, I learned something about myself. I'm a people photographer, there's no way around it.
    While most photographers, and normal people, would have taken photos of Times Square, I took about 20 photos of my son looking at Times Square and given the distance between he and I, my lens wasn't wide enough to capture really any of Times Square itself.

A normal person would have taken a photo such as this (pictured below) and she would have completely missed her son's first experience with massive electronic billboard advertising, and then before you know it her son's hanging out with the wrong crowd but she doesn't notice because she's taking scenery photos, then he's on drugs, and then in jail.

Here are some ceramic tiles hung on a fence to remember 9/11 which were mailed from all over the country in support. I remember that they had similar fences like this in OKC with notes and photos. It is extremely overwhelming to be there and remember the attack. God be with those families.

Todd is either bowing in a moment of silence or texting someone, I don't know.

Then we took a walk through Central Park--another amazing sight! The park is enormous and right in the middle of so much commotion you have a scenic getaway where you can't even hear the outside city.

This is the part of Central Park where we were supposed to get mugged but no one was even there,
what a rip off!

There is a castle in the middle of the park that was originally designed to be a lookout tower for muggers, or fire. I think they mostly looked out for fire, because fire is easier to see, plus muggers wear black masks.

Sunday

We hopped back on the tour bus to see Brooklyn. For those of you who don't know, Manhattan is what you might call an islet (Although I'm not sure that's true. I was tired in high school.) so you have to cross a bridge over the East River to get to Brooklyn. Here we are crossing the Williamsburg Bridge. Can somebody clear this up--was Sesame Street supposed to be in New York or Chicago? Because it looked like it was supposed to be in Brooklyn. That's what I'd guess if I were a betting person, or a stereotyper.

Crossing the bridge. Again, no standing is allowed on the bus so we've got a pretty large shot of people and a couple inches of scenery. These kind of photos are like reading, use your imagination, it's good for you.

This was kind of a long weekend for James so we won't blame him for not paying attention to Brooklyn.

This is why there was no standing allowed on the bus. The traffic lights were very low but the trees made contact with us several times.

At the South Street Seaport we found a ship called Ambrose and had to take a photo for our little James Ambrose.

He snoozed a little longer than we thought he would so we had to cover the pink spots as delicately as possible so we wouldn't wake him up.

See what I'm saying? Here's a slightly scenic photo with no one we know in there--borrrring.

James loves dogs. He's very brave. Also uninformed on their abilities.

Thank you, Uncle Todd, for such a wonderful and generous vacation! We really had a great time with everyone and can't wait to come back again. I, too, love New York.

Thanks to my Mom who cleaned our entire house while we were gone making it possible for me to post this blog instead of cleaning that yellow film out of the bathroom sink which I am still maintaining is only paint.