An End of Summer Trip to Quito

After a year in New York, we had about a month before needing to be back in Knoxville. We decided to ease the transition by taking a trip to Quito, Ecuador. The purpose of the trip was, first and foremost, to catch up with some friends who had been living in Knoxville before we left for New York and are now back in Ecuador. Their son and our Little Lady are good friends and they were both excited to see each other. The time in Ecuador would also give the LL a chance to be immersed in a Spanish language environment for a few weeks to bolster her bilingualism. It was also a chance for another adventure.

Holiday Season NYC, Part 5 - Holiday Windows

New York is justifiably famous for its flagship department stores. And one of the annual events is the windows that they unveil during the holiday season. On the busy streets of Manhattan, an attention-grabbing window is seen by thousands upon thousands of people each day. Windows are very valuable marketing space. And the stores use this space to maximum advantage. And we used their efforts to our maximum advantage by taking a look at pretty much all the major stores this year.

Holiday Season NYC, Part 4 - Santas!

The Little Lady is 5. Surprisingly, she really does not care all that much about Santa Claus. She knows who he is, of course, but it's not like she was just dying to meet him this year. But we are in New York, and I would have been surprised if some of the best Santas cannot be found here. I mean it seems like there is this little under-the-radar movie about a little girl and the Macy's down on 34th Street. So it would have been just a little wrong not to check out some of the options, right? We did. And we found the real Santa Claus.

Holiday Season NYC, Part 3 - Tea at The Plaza

The Little Lady has been excited about the Eloise stories ever since we got to New York. These are a series of stories about a 6 year old who lives with her mother in the Plaza Hotel. She is always getting into trouble and having many adventures in the city and in the Plaza. It so happens that we live about 6 blocks from the historic Plaza Hotel. One of the things they do there is an Eloise-themed tea for kids in the Palm Court. This is something Eloise did in the stories, and the Little Lady was excited to give it a try. You can do this at any time of the year, but we figured doing it during the holiday season with the hotel all decked out would make for an even more memorable experience. We had fun. I would not do it again.

Holiday Season NYC Part 2 - Retro Subway Ride

Last weekend featured two particular highlights: Seeing the New York City Ballet perform The Nutcracker and taking a ride on very old subway cars from our neighborhood station. It was easier to take photos of the subway experience, so I'll start there. But The Nutcracker was also great fun. I'll post on that separately.

First Snow of the Winter

Saturday marked the first snow this winter in NY. After the Little Lady finished up with her Spanish class, we decided to head out to Central Park to take advantage of the fresh snow. We wore ourselves out, but had a great time. See all the carriages driving by in the snow was beautiful. The atmosphere was one of celebration. And the snow hanging in the tree branches made for a magical setting. Mostly photos below with minimal commentary.

Holiday Season NYC, Part 1 - Botanical Garden Train Show

It is a true pleasure to be living in NYC during the holidays. We took advantage by seeing the Macy's Parade in person. But there is an amazing richness of events and places to visit in the run-up to Christmas. We are doing our best to take full advantage. One of our first experiences was a visit to the New York Botanical Garden (NYBG) Holiday Train Show.