Geocaching Happy

We did some geocaching today, even though it was about 40 degrees out.  It had been 3 weeks since our last outing and we were just itching to get out.  So, we just hit some quick cache and dash ones (park real close, easy to find, sign and go) in Lititz, but we broke our single day record by racking up nine!  Oh, and we had fun along the way, the bullet point recap of our geocaching day:

• Seeing an encore performance of Jill's super cute "I found the cache" dance after she found her second one.
• Finding a bird's nest right below a cache.  No birds or eggs in it though.
• Natalie shaking a round shaped cache like it was a jingle bell.  It didn't ding. :)
• A dead bird near another cache.  Luckily, we quickly realized it was on the other side of the wall and moved over there before the kids could spy it.
• Shamrock shaped pretzels!
  
• Adorable Natalie trying in vain to catch up to her sister while walking to a cache.
• Seeing the joy on their little faces when they see the cache is big enough to hold trinkets to swap.
  
• Realizing how much quicker caching will be when the kids can do their own seat belts!
• Being together as a family!
• Listening to the kids tell Mommy and Daddy to "Look both ways!!!" as we approach a curb.  See, geocaching can teach life lessons!!
  
• Finally making good on a promise to get chocolate ice cream cone lollipops at Wilbur.

And our favorite geocaching memory of today?  We were searching for this cache and had started walking away when a car pulled up.  A woman gets out and heads straight to where we had been looking.  Daddy shouts "Let us know if you find it" and she responds that she knows where it is because she put it there!  She's saw a bunch of did not finds on the web site and came out to check on it.  The woman was very friendly and Jillian thought she was "super cool" and even asked if we could take a picture with her.  So here's our customary Find photo with mesham13.  

Pictures in the Park

Way back in November, Mommy's friend Stef came with us to the park to take our picture.  The photos were wonderful, but since they were for our Christmas card, we kept them under wraps.  But now Christmas is way past over and here they are!

PS. Thanks again Stef!  It was a fun day!  

NYC Pt. 3

They were there, at last!  The Daily Show studio.  

Now they just needed to wait two hours in the cold and wind to get inside.  Thankfully the interns took pity and let everyone in earlier than usual...

Excited?  Or just relieved to be getting out of the cold?

The door to the studio

"Abandon news, all ye who enter here"

After the show, they went back to pick up their luggage, hit the M&M store for gifts for the kiddies and then grabbed a bite to eat.  Mommy took Daddy to a little pizza place she had discovered with Stef a few years ago, Don Giovanni.  It was as yummy as she remembered!   Then they got on the train and were home by midnight.  It was a busy 32 hours in the city!

NYC Pt. 2

New York City - Day 2.

The rain stopped and was replaced by very cold temperatures and blustery winds. Mommy gave Daddy a little lecture about getting tickets in the spring or summer next time!

First order of business was the NBC Studio tour. They got to:

• ask the pages if Kenneth (the page from 30 Rock) has made their lives difficult and if they are obsessive about their jackets
• see where Brian Williams tapes the "Nightly News"
• learn cool things about the SNL set and how 400,000 people apply for the 1500 tickets that are available each year
• see a random person getting a photo shoot done on the SNL stage. (Mommy and Daddy like to think he was some new cast member or guest host. But he was probably just an NBC suit getting his corporate photo taken.)

Then Daddy got to participate! He volunteered to be the anchor for our tour's demonstration. He bought the video to show his students, so it might be coming to a YouTube page near you soon! He put on his announcer voice and did great!

After the NBC tour, Mommy and Daddy did a architecture/history tour of Rockefeller Plaza. It was freezing as they walked outside the buildings but interesting nonetheless.

Here's a tidbit of info... Junior Rockefeller was a very religious man. He wanted Atlas's world to frame the cross at St. Patrick's Cathedral across the street. Oh and he wouldn't use the side entrances to 30 Rock because of the nudes etched into the building. (His wife was an art patron and convinced him they were appropriate! She started MoMA.)

After the tour, Daddy wanted to see Central Park. So they headed toward 5th Avenue and window shopped. And wouldn't you know it, what store is located across the street from Central Park??? Golly gee, it is the Apple Store! Now, did Daddy really want to see the park or the Apple Store? Hmmmm....

But the store was pretty neat. There is nothing above ground but the glass box. You have to go down (via stairs or elevator) to get the store. And it was packed! It figures though, everyone seems to have an iPhone in NYC.

Mommy and Daddy decided to get something to eat. Since they were right there, they ate at the cafe at the Central Park Zoo. Afterwards, they had some time kill before the show, so they headed out the rear exit of the cafe and visited the rain forest exhibit and caught the penguins in a feeding frenzy (very cool to see). (These are puffins... the penguin pictures didn't turn out.)

As they were leaving, they noticed the zoo ticket booth and realized the zoo wasn't free after all! Oops!  The guy minding the door in the cafe must have stepped away for a minute...

It was time to leave for the taping. Daddy's super helpful iPhone told them exactly which bus would take them to the studio in Hell's Kitchen. The bus driver was great. His bus wasn't the one the iPhone recommended, but the driver told them he'd get them there and then he refused to let them pay.  There ARE nice people in NYC! :)

NYC

Mommy and Daddy went to New York City! It all started when Daddy got tickets to see a taping of The Daily Show with Jon Stewart. Then Nonna and TOF gave them a hotel room for Christmas and the day trip turned into a overnight getaway...

We took the train from Lancaster to Penn Station. It was great!

Here's Mommy in Times Square. When they arrived, it was a drizzly sort of day, not wonderful for sightseeing, so they decided to do a show. Mommy stood in line at the TKTS booth while Daddy checked into the hotel, which was awesomely just 100 yards away! (PS. the M&Ms store was just across the street too!) Daddy was able to check in, drop our luggage and make it back just as Mommy got to the ticket window.

After feasting on some cheese and crackers in the gorgeous hotel room, they headed out to the matinee. They were early... just early enough to stop at the bar next to the theater for a pre-show drink.

They saw Guys and Dolls. For Mommy it had Lauren Graham from "The Gilmore Girls" as Adelaide and for Daddy, Nathan Detroit was played by Oliver Platt, who did a extended guest star turn on "The West Wing". So it was a win-win and a good show to boot!

Dinner:  They decided to eat the girls college funds at this steakhouse. :) Steak for two: 1.5 inch thick porterhouse that was just amazing. And there were waitstaff everywhere! Daddy got up to use the facilities and someone immediately swooped in to fold his napkin. Very yummy!  

But the fun thing was getting there.  The rain had stopped and it was a beautiful night for a walk.  They saw Bryant Park where crews were dismantling the tents from Fashion Week, the Public Library and Grand Central Station.  And they took the time to find a hidden gem the concierge told them about.  Inside Grand Central is a little wine bar called Campbell's Apartment, that was an office of a friend of Vanderbilt when the station was built.  It was gorgeous!

Will is 5!

Friday Fun

After a long week of work and daycare, what could be better than a trip to the Hands On House and some face painting???  That's just what we did Friday night.

Then Mommy and Daddy made a cake for Will's birthday party.  

Jill makes lunch for Mommy

Mommy was out last night and while she was gone, Jillian decided to pack Mommy a lunch. Daddy had called Mommy in tears as she was doing it, but Mommy didn't quite get it until she walked in and saw the neatly (overfilled!) bag sitting on the hoosier inside the front door. Jill was so proud of herself, and just completely adorable as she unpacked it to show Mommy everything she had bagged, sealed and packed.

Inside:

a nice serving of chicken bruschetta from dinner that night

applesauce

pineapples

2 bags of grapes

a string cheese

an apple

and...

a ziplock bag with 4 baked ziti noodles in it.

The best part?  

Awwww...

Quadruple Date

We spent the day after Valentine's Day with our friends the Sensenigs, on what Miss Val described as our Quadruple Date.  After the kids asking about a hundred times, we FINALLY went bowling again, and this time, Natalie and Zack were old enough to play!

Natalie's first ball... yup, she didn't get a single pin.

The older ones showing their siblings the ropes.

Photographic evidence that Daddy will change Mommy's score if she turns out to be beating him.  :)

Zack spent some time hiding...

We decided to quit after having yet another ball that didn't make it down the lane. We were almost done and were starting to feel really bad for the poor guy who most likely had many other things he could have been doing besides running to our lanes every 10 minutes!

If you give a 5 year old a camera...

Valentine's Day

We've had a wonderful Valentine's Day!

We woke up and opened presents... Mommy and Daddy got the girls cups with their initials on them.  A while ago Mommy had bought two juice cups with a J and N on them, but sadly they were very thin glass and both broke.  So Mommy went surfing on ETSY.com and had replacements (plastic ones!) custom made for our little valentines.  They were very happy!

Next it was off to Market...

Showing the love

We had special surprise guests at Market... Grandma & Pap!  We showed them how we spend each Saturday morning and then they came back to the house to visit some more.

Jillian and Pap playing with Valentine presents.

Natalie introducing Grandma to the Lorax 

(and giving one of her infamous hand massages)

Then, we headed to Nonna & Tof's house for lunch and to welcome them back from their Mexican vacation!  And guess what?  There were even more presents!

After nap and dinner, Daddy had to leave for a basketball game, but the girls had a special night... a Dora movie and, YUM!, popcorn!

More Jilli art

More art by Jillian.  Or rather, Jilli, as she signed almost all of her valentines.  Whether she's going with an alternative spelling of Jilly or just got tired writing those last two letters, we're not completely sure!  Whatever she calls herself, her artwork has recently stepped up a notch and we are in awe of her abilities.

Some very impressive hearts in honor of Valentine's Day.   Last year her hearts were pretty much circles!

This is a maze from our house to school, and the earth in the middle.

(Did you know the earth is mostly water?  Jillian relayed that tidbit of info to us over the weekend!)

This is our neighborhood, or maybe our neighborhood in a future time.  See, the house in the middle is Mommy and Daddy's, but the house in the lower left is Jill and Will's, because they are "married now".  

(We're just excited to hear we get a house of our own!  About six months ago Jill informed us that we had to live with her and Will forever.  When we asked if Will was going to live with his parents too, she responded that he was and that Natalie and Zack were going to live there too. That was going to have to be pretty big house!)

 

Another house picture. Note the lamp and bed with pillow and bed skirt.  Oh, and the moon and star in the top right.

Here's a tree house.  

But check out this close-up...  to the best of our knowledge she did these drawings strictly from memory!

Wow Wow Wubzy  (a show we don't even watch!)

Arthur - from some of her favorite books