Entering the second week of our New York adventure, the days began to fly by as we continued to tick off our list of things we wanted to see and do...
I was generously allowed a 'Mummy only' shopping day whilst Daddy entertained the kids for the day. We had discovered a small, quiet and little-known ice skating rink on one of our earlier walks at the South Seaport, so the kids spent about 3 hours having the best time skating. For about 2/3 of that time, they apparently had the entire rink all to themselves!
Meanwhile, I was having a ball shopping... Century 21 was great for bargains, and I enjoyed the best homewares store (Crate and Barrell) where I found some cute Christmas decorations for 50% off. I was still keen to go back to the New York Public Library, so wandered around there and refuelled with a hot chocolate whilst enjoying the front courtyard and playing on Beth's camera...
After a long day, both parties met up at MoMa (the Museum of Modern Art) at 4pm, where entry is free from 4pm to 6pm on Fridays. We were all a little tired and hungry, but we still wandered through and admired some of the Monets, van Goghs, Picassos, eventually finding some of Andy Warhol's well-known Campbell's Soup pop art.
On Saturday, we were keen to check out the farmer's markets at Union Square on what was a gorgeous and warm day. Here we had heaps of fun trying and purchasing some of the best and freshest local New York/ New Jersey produce. Our favourite discovery was probably the hot apple cider (basically hot fresh-pressed apple juice), and we went home with organic whole milk, fresh artisan bread and cheese, local apples, organic yogurt, and some fresh local veg straight from the farmer. Yummmm...
Sunday turned out to be a winter 'heatwave', with temps up around 19 degrees. It was funny to see some New Yorkers making the most of the heat and getting around in shorts and Tshirts!! We had a quiet day, visiting a local church (Hillsong New York), doing laundry and a little Christmas shopping.
That evening, we took advantage of the warmer weather to do 'Top of the Rock', which is the viewing platform at the top of the Rockefeller Center. It was much more bearable than the top of the Empire State Building had been and the lights of the city were certainly dazzling and pretty. We could even see the Empire State Building dressed up in Christmas colours.
Following this, we were wide awake and ready to enjoy the Christmas atmosphere with the thousands of other people who were walking the streets and enjoying Christmas displays and lights. Streets were blocked off for pedestrians, there were NYPD cops everywhere directing people and traffic, and street carts selling all sorts of delicious smelling food. Everything felt alive, buzzing, and heaps of fun!
Our last stop for the night was the much-anticipated Nintendo World. Liam and Beth were both extremely happy to finally visit this most exciting shop. There were game consoles to play everywhere, as well as plenty of merchandise to consider taking home as a souvenir. (Sadly, the shop closed about 5 minutes after we went inside, so we had to plan a return visit another day).
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