A Tale of our Trip, in Pictures

So, our trip started out in Connecticut, where we attended a family reunion, as I mentioned earlier. That Saturday evening, we went out to a restaurant in West Haven called Jimmies. It's right on Long Island Sound, and after dinner, we out on the beach area where the kids enjoyed collecting shells and playing around. Incidentally, we did not suddenly gain a third child. Taylor is my cousin from Kentucky who happily joined us on our trip. She and Rebekah are the same age. We were thrilled to have her along, and I hope the Lazurek Funny Farm didn't frighten her too much!

Taylor and Rebekah pose on the beach. Rebekah looks kind of drunk, I know, but I promise that I've not been allowing underage drinking. She just looks that way a lot of the time! I blame it on pre-teen girlie-girl temporary loss of practical brain cells.

The darling Czech Pecker walking out on the jetty with J.P. and Taylor.

The same jetty. The darling Czech Pecker, J.P., Taylor, and Rebekah walking out. You can see the darling Czech Pecker's grey hair in this picture. He likes to blame it on me, but I think it's all that Eastern European Existentialism getting to him.

Sunday arrived, and it was time to go into the City. We took the train from Stratford, CT.

J.P., Taylor, and Rebekah at the train station in Stratford. I can't remember exactly WHY J.P. had an attitude at the time, but really, does he have to have a reason?

Taylor and Rebekah on the train. Notice that Rebekah STILL has the drunk look on her face!

Grand Central Station! Taylor, Rebekah, Bob (Granddaddy to the kids!), and J.P. This photo was actually taken at the END of the day...note that the girls already have their American Girl dolls. We can explain Rebekah's drunk look that way, then. Not on the dolls...on the fact that it was the end of the day.

Taylor, Rebekah, and J.P. at Grand Central Station.

Of course, if you are a pre-teen girl, no trip to New York is complete without spending an inordinate amount of time in American Girl and then having lunch in the Cafe there. Rebekah decided that she wanted a plethora of American Girl stuff for her birthday from us, so we headed straight for there.

In these photos taken in the American Girl Cafe, you will note Taylor with her new doll, Ruthie, and Rebekah with her new dolls, Kaya and Julie. Yes, Rebekah DOES look drunk! However, I am the one who had a Bellini to drink because after two hours of traipsing up and down three stories of a crowded store, I desperately needed either that or a Xanax. J.P. shows what he really thinks of the whole thing, but being a boy, he finds ways to amuse himself.

Our next stop was St. Patrick's Cathedral. This was more up J.P.'s alley since he is John PATRICK, and St. Patrick is one of his patron saints.

Above, an outside view of St. Pat's; the girls dress their American Girl dolls on the steps outside of St. Pat's--in the background, J.P. is showing something to the darling Czech Pecker; inside of St. Pat's, J.P., Rebekah, and Taylor.

On Monday, we cruised through Central Park, checking out the sights there. I was on a quest for the statue of Balto!

And I found him!

Dedication to the sled dogs who ran the medicine to Nome

Taylor, J.P., and Rebekah pose with Balto

J.P., Taylor, and Rebekah posing in front of the statue of another of my heroes, Shakespeare! None of them were thrilled or impressed.

A red tail hawk with its prey, a squirrel, in Central Park

We also had to go to the top of the Empire State Building and see what kind of view we could get from there.

The New York skyline from the top of the Empire State Building.

The United Nations Building. It's the silvery rectangular building in the center, on this side of the river.

A hazy, fuzzy view of the Statue of Liberty

A pigeon perching just a few inches from me!

And there you go, a short photo diary of our short visit to New York. I wish I had taken some more pictures, but we were so busy trying to keep up with the kids and herd them through the streets. I felt kind of like a cattle wrangler or something! We also ended up not having time to go out to Ellis Island as we had originally planned and hoped to do. I would like for the kids to do that because the darling Czech Pecker's great-grandparents came through there. It would be interesting for them to see, and that background is so different from my own, where my family has been here for many thousands of years, some of them, and others for over 300 years. Maybe on a future trip...