Luna's Last Day of School

Luna just finished her last day of school!  The year flew by.  Here she is with her teachers Alysa and Matt (they only go by first names at her school).  She continues to love school, just LOVES it.  Her favorite activity is "work time" as they call it in her classroom which is actually free play time :)  She loves the social interactions at school and the friendships.  She is going to miss all her friends!

Luna has thrived in school and in the city.  It is amazing how independent she has become which school has encourage and developed even more in her. If she ever got lost in the city I have no doubt she could get her self back to our apartment.  She knows how the systems work and how to get places.  It is amazing how quickly she picked it up.  When we have babysitters and when they ask me how to get to the library or a certain park so they can take girls, Luna will always tell them she can show them.   This kid is on it.  When we are walking down the side walk, she will yell across the street "Hi Henry's mom"  or "Hi Ava"  always seeing someone she knows.  The city suits her, at times it feels like she was made for the city.  So glad we were able to come and have these two years here.

Field Day

Luna's first field day was this week.  The k, 1st and 2nd graders were all together with organized games at Rockefeller Park.  It was hot, in the 90s and the kids were in the direct sun.  They had fun but at times the heat was just too much for them.  I volunteered to help out and was assigned 7 kids from  Luna's class and took them to the different station.  We were team orange, hence the orange piggy tails. But really what I did was constantly encourage them to drink water and poured water over their heads :)   

I had fun watching Luna play the different games.  Here are some photos from the day.

Egg on the spoon relay.

Taking a well earned water break.

Watermelon station, brilliant!

Whole Foods Tribeca

My regular grocery store has become Whole Foods.  Before moving to the city I had only shopped there a handful of times but now that it is kitty corner to my apartment it is my go to store.

Again since space is a premium here in the city the way Whole Foods handles the lines for check out is quite unique.  They had to figure out a way to handle a lot of people queuing up to check out.  Today I finally took a picture of the check out lines.  Basically when you walk up to check out there are six lines that are color coded.  In the photo below, you can see the colors on both the floor and the arrows hanging from the ceiling.  You pick the line that looks the shortest (they all move at the exact same speed).  When a check out register becomes available the number lights up on the computer screen in one of the color columns.  If you look at the photo you can see the number 21 in the green column.  So the person at the front of the green line goes to register number 21.  Then next number with come up in the orange/red column and then purple.  It is extremely efficient, the only trick is finding the shortest line.  Otherwise it is fool proof. Some times the lines are ten deep (especially at lunchtime), making that 60 people waiting in line at one time. Pretty impressive system I must say.

Rachel on the Subway

When we first moved to the city, Rachel was scared of riding the subway.  It was loud and scary to her.  She would cling to either Brian and I never smiling.  Above is a picture taken during our first fall in the city.  I love it, she is clinging on for dear life.

Last week, I took Rachel up to the Central Park Zoo just the two of us and snapped this photo of her on the subway.  Now she is a pro standing up, her feet in the right position and holding on to the bar all while singing songs and having fun.  What a difference two years made :) 

Father's Day

We had a great Father's Day celebrating our special Daddy.  The girls each made something especially for Daddy.  Rachel worked on a tool box in class, she made it and wrapped it up at school. So it was a surprise for all of us and she kept it a secret no matter how hard I tried to get it out of her :)  She was determined not to tell anyone.   It was a precious gift, she was so proud of herself.

 Luna picked out a brownie recipe and made brownies for Daddy, she knows him well.  We all enjoyed that gift at the end of the day.

We had a nice breakfast and then went to church.  After church we spent the afternoon at Central Park.  Daddy read and the girls played in the play ground.  We loved celebrating Brian and what a blessing he is to our family.

Art in the Park

The parks in our neighborhood are really amazing.  May through October they offer different activities for kids Monday through Friday.   They have soccer, basketball, arts & crafts, games and gardening.  All the activities have staff that lead them but parents must supervise.  We go regularly to say the least.

 Last Thursday Rachel did art in the park in the morning while Luna was in school.  They were painting.  I would say they had at least 75 preschoolers come and paint over the course of the hour.  They are well equipped to handle all the kids with plenty of supplies and space.  It was great.  While we were there we ran into 5 kids from Rachel preschool so we had a play date afterwards with all her friends.  Then we all walked to one of the kiddos apartments for lunch at their private roof top garden.  It was lovely. 

Then, after we picked up Luna from school, both girls went back and did the afternoon art session which was using playdoh and beads to make art sculptures. This time two kiddos from Luna's class were there as well so they created together and then hit the swings.

After some swing time, they participated in the organized games.  They played with a parachute and a number of different type of tag games.  We stayed until 5:30 and then headed home so I could make dinner and the girls got a bath.  It was a typical afternoon in the park for us.  See why I love this place?

The girls playing with the parachute.

Lined up to learn the rules for the next game.

Mohawk

Luna rocking her mohawk!

Kite Flying in Tear Drop Park

Last weekend, Rachel and Luna went to a Birthday party of a friend from Rachel's class.  The party was held in the party room of her apartment building and then they took it outside to Tear Drop Park.  They provided the kids with kites.  Here is Luna flying hers. It looks like the park is empty but trust me that was not the case.  There were a couple of near misses and a few toddlers were knocked over but in the end everyone survived.  It was a lot of fun for the kids but not enough wind to keep the kites up for too long.

End of the Year Kindergarten Picnic

Last Friday, the Kindergarten classes at Luna's school were planning on having an end of the year picnic.  Just as the picnic was starting and everyone had settled onto the grass a massive rain storm passed through.  The type of storm that will completely drench you in 10 seconds.  We all ran for cover while some of the kiddos played in the rain, Luna included. Luckily she already had her bathing suit on, so she was ready to get wet.

It rained for about 15 minutes, enough to completely soak everything and the picnic was officially over.  To say the kids were disappointed is an understatement.  So when we got back to the apartment we had our own little family picnic.  The girls were happy and so were we. :) 

Rachel's Last Day of Preschool

Last week was Rachel's last day of school.  Historically she is not a kid that does well with transitions.  Once she is some where she is happy but to switch activities and move to something new is hard for her.  It is common for her to cry before school, saying she does not want to go, that she does not like her teachers, etc.  What she is really saying is that she likes what she is doing at that moment and does not want to stop for any reason.  So we often times get tears before school.  The last day was no exception but instead this time she was crying because she was not going to get to see her friend Thaddeaus any more since it was the last day of school.  :(  Moving can be so hard :(

Here is Rachel and "faddeaus" as she calls him, at the park one day after school.  They adore each other, two peas in a pod.

Memorial Day Picnic

For Memorial Day, we headed out to Long Island.  Brian's boss from work, Ari, invited it out to his house in Great Neck.  We took the train out and Ari met us at the train station with his daughter.  We spent a little while at his house and Rachel got to pet their bunny :)  Then we headed over to the community pool for some swimming and a BBQ.

The girls had a lot of fun in the pool.  They both jumped off the diving board a few times and had fun playing in the water.  Both girls are getting more and more independent in the water, as a parent it is fun to watch.  Then we caught the train back home.  It was a wonderful day outside of the city.

Funny story about Ari.  At school Rachel has a friend named Ari and Brian's boss is named Ari.  One night I was tucking Rachel into bed and she looked at me and said "you know what Mommy, both Daddy and I have Aris."

Bring your kids to work day

Last week the girls went to Daddy's work for "Bring your kids to work day." I picked them up from school at noon and then we took the subway up to Google.  The girls were really excited :) They spent their time coloring, building Lego robots and painting ceramic bowls.  They were kept busy and had a great time.  Daddy brought them home on the subway in time for dinner :)

Jenn and Ryan Visit

A couple weeks ago Jenn and Ryan came for a visit.  I love showing people our life here in the city and with Jenn and Ryan about to embark on their own journey to London they were looking at city in a different light from our other visitors. 

They arrived Thursday evening and the adults had a nice night out without the kiddos, low key just catching up on life.  During their time here we had some unusually cold weather.  On Saturday, it was cold,windy and rainy, I had Rachel in her winter coat!  We went and saw the outside of the Cosby house, although disappointingly the house was under construction and so we took some photos on the stoop next door :)

Sunday after church we headed over to Governors Island, one of our favorite places to visit on the weekend.  Again the weather was windy windy windy but still fun to be out and about.  They left Monday morning.  It was a wonderful visit.  We had lots of adult time to talk, which with small children does not always happen.

Thanks for visiting Jenn and Ryan.  We hope you love London and can't wait to visit you there!

Church Retreat

This past spring our church had an all church retreat at a hotel in Princeton, New Jersey.  I have to say it was amazing.  So many families from the church made it a priority to be there and we got to know many families that much better.  We took the train out.  Then a van pick us up from the train station and took us to the hotel.

For the entire weekend there were child care workers that came to provide activities for the kids during the day.  They also watched the kids in our hotel rooms at night so that the parents could enjoy conversations and games, such a treat.  We met up with the girls for meals and at night.  It was like camp for the kids.

This is a photo of Luna and a friend of hers that is in her kindergarten class and also attends our church.  One of the days they made this butterfly together.  They could not decide who should get it at the end of the weekend so they decided Luna would take it home first and keep it for three days.  Then Luna was to bring it to school so her friend could keep it for three days and just continue the cycle. I think it made it through one trade off :)

During one of the sessions, the childcare works took all the kids swimming!  The girls loved it!  You can see Luna in the blue swim cap and Rachel in the pink one.  Each night they were tired and had no problem going to bed in the hotel room with the sitter.  It was a wonderful week, such love was poured out on us.  Thank you Lower Manhattan Community Church!