Days One and Two in Tuckahoe

I'm pleasantly surprised at how well things are going for my Nanajan Five-Day Retreat. The kids are remarkably well-behaved, (except the usual sibling bickering) and I'm feeling pretty good about myself (knock on wood).

My first big accomplishment was getting back home from LaGuardia Airport after dropping Laura and Alan off to catch their plane. Later that day we ventured to Costco and Stop-n-Shop for some vittles and made it back home from there as well. (I keep calling the grocery store "Stop-n-Go" which is very frustrating to Connor) We also walked to the park two blocks away in 91 degree/42% humidity and played until we were all red-faced and sweaty.

Today we stayed home until after Andrew's nap. In the morning we went out in the yard and played with balloons. My $5 investment in balloons and a pump returned 45 minutes of extreme fun!

I can't do balloon animals, but I did do balloon hats, or in Andrew's case it was more of a necklace. They really wore them most of the day!

In the afternoon we went to Old Navy where I had a return and we got bouncy balls - another great investment at $.75! Then we went to both Staples and Best Buy to get a card reader so I could load my pictures from my camera onto the computer. (I forgot my cord) Seriously, can you believe I found Staples, but then they didn't have one, so we found Best Buy. Both stops involving getting three children in and out of carseats and in and out of the stores. I'm amazing!

We planned to go to Sagamore park (thanks for the hint and the map , Alan!) to play with our bouncy balls, but when we got there, there was no place to park. Because of road construction there were big signs everywhere saying you couldn't park on the road and we couldn't find anywhere else to park. So we took Alan's other advice and had dinner at the:


How crazy am I? I took three kids by myself to a sit-down restaurant. It went amazingly well and we had yummy food and excellent service. In fact, the kids like it there because they get a "glow-in-the-dark" bracelet and crayons and a page to color. They shared a cheese quesadilla and had chocolate milk and lots of chips. I had delicious fish tacos that came with rice and black beans - Andrew ate most of the rice and black beans! Since we couldn't park on the street, we parked in a lot across the street with a meter. I didn't have a any quarters so I asked our server how serious they are about the meters at 5:30 at night. He said they're pretty serious and offered to make change for me and run across the street and feed the meter for me so I wouldn't have to take all the kids - and they say New Yorkers aren't nice! I beg to differ! (He got a nice tip)

After dinner the kids still insisted on some park time so we just went home and then walked to the neighborhood park we went to yesterday. Even at 6:30 pm it was still 88 degrees/66% humidity. We came home for baths and stories and bedtime.

Abby on the slide

Three kids on swings.
They all are constantly asking for "underdogs" - rather a trick for this Nana. Even Andrew pats the back of his swing and says "dog"

I'm amazed at how Andrew literally falls into his crib at bedtime and naptime, just thrilled to be there!