week 1 in NYC

so our summer has begun and I will do my best to provide weekly updates of our time here. so far we have a good schedule and are staying incredibly busy while Mathew is at work.

monday: we still had our rental car from our trip to Palmyra and Philadelphia so we made a trip to Wal-Mart...several hundred dollars later we made it home with a car full of food that will hopefully last us through the summer. a box of cereal at the local market (3 blocks away) costs $5.20! Hence the reason to stock up at Wal-Mart.

tuesday: sharla and i with the girls braved the subway and made a trip to Union Square. we hit up a couple of shops, but more importantly found a Trader Joe's! if you aren't familiar with TJ's it is AWESOME! I had to limit my purchases because we still had a subway ride home and carrying elle and the stroller up and down the subway isn't exactly easy. we made it back in time for elle to take an afternoon nap and then after she woke up we headed to the park until Mathew got home from his first day of work.
Kendra and Elle swinging in Riverside Park outside of our apartment

wednesday: elle and i packed a lunch and made our way down to time square. they say in an effort to save energy they shut down a couple blocks on time square and set up a ton of lawn chairs (random). it worked out perfectly for elle and i, we took a seat in the middle of time square and had lunch. elle was so curious about all of the people and the lights. we even ran into the promotional team for ABC's Wipeout. elle wasn't really sure what to think about the big red balls with hands. we also ran into the famous Naked Cowboy....it was a little awkward when he came up to elle and was singing and dancing. elle received her first lap dance at 15 months old... on our way back home we strolled through central park and she realized that central park has tons of horse drawn carriages. every few minutes she would stop and point and watch all of the horses trot by.




thursday: sharla (who you will be hearing a lot about this summer) and I ...with the girls of course went to the Swiss Cottage to watch a Peter Pan marionette puppet show. elle and kendra (who are the same age) checked out after 30 minutes or so, but really enjoyed the first half of the show. we also packed lunches and had a picnic on the great lawn in Central Park next to the Turtle Pond and the Castle...IN CENTRAL PARK!


and of course after her afternoon nap we went to the park and she played. we went to a park that had sand and she LOVED it. it was straight to the bath after we were done.

that evening Sharla, Chloe (MBA student with Mathew, interning at CitiGroup), her friend and I went to dinner at La Focaccia and the had treats from Levain Bakery, which were incredible! they have cookies that are the size of my head (no joke!)
friday: Sharla, the girls and I ran to Old Navy then I walked 20 blocks to meet Mathew half way for lunch. we weren't really able to spend time together, but I was able to pass off his sandwich. elle was in melt down mode after the hand off so we headed back home and she took a nap. after her nap, we made our daily trip to the park and then had take-out indian food with the Lovell's at their apartment.


saturday: a jam packed day full of fun! we went to the Children's Museum of Manhattan, which is an interactive museum and elle loved it.



elle tried to step into the water, but i caught her before her entire leg went in.


we went and had shakes from the Shake Shack and ate lunch outside, elle sneaked my shake and was sucking it down. this is also where we had Bruce Willis walk 3 ft. in front of us!
after our shakes we went into the Natural History Museum for a quick look inside. our friend Lauren came to visit so we left the museum early to go meet up with some other friends. Luckily mathew, with his Amex badge gets us into the museums for FREE! (Thanks Amex!) It saved us about $60 in museum entry fees just on saturday!
after the park and meeting up with friends we playing in Central Park in Sheep's Meadow. elle found a little dog that became her best friend...she was hilarious and became quite an attraction to onlookers.

the great lawn in Central Park.
sunday: we made our first trip to the new ward. we meet in the building that is underneath the Temple in NYC. i think it will be a great ward and am very excited about.

it has been a super busy week and just the start of an excellent summer!