Weeeeeeeeee!

Well now that school is over and summer is in full swing, we are taking a few days off and enjoying the sun. We hope you have a good weekend and – if we don’t post sooner – we wish you a great 4th of July. We’ll be back soon.

Zoe loves driving with the windows down – wind in her hair:

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Adventures NYC

NYC Parks and Backpacker Magazine had their 8th annual ‘Adventures NYC‘ at the Bandshell in Central Park. This event was a fun, free ‘exploration for families’ day. There was a giant pool installed by the bandshell where Ezra tried his hand at rowing a paddle board, and an area where kids and adults could run in a giant hamster wheel. The more experiences you had, the more stamps you got in your ‘passport’ — and then you would be rewarded with a free snow cone (or various other prizes) after working really hard for it! I loved that the lake near Loeb Boathouse – normally reserved for only rowboats – also had kayakers in it. Central Park looked a bit like a camp for a day.

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End of school year indulgence ..

What better way to celebrate the end of a school year and all of Ezra’s hard work than with a trip to Dylan’s Candy Bar in Manhattan? This trip didn’t happen on his actual last day of school but it was fueled by the thinking that summer was well on it’s way. The kids loved all the colorful displays and candy organized by color, and I was amazed by the kids’ restraint – they managed to get out of there with only 1/4 bag full of candies each! The store itself is the most enjoyable part – with its stairs inlaid with candy, jelly bean mosaic and shelves dripping with chocolate. And yes, that huge chocolate bunny is really made up entirely of chocolate!

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Central Park Zoo with Zoe

I found these older photos in my camera and nearly didn’t blog about them. You can see that it’s spring and the leaves look like new fuzz on the trees. Zoe was still sporting her cozy stockings. But now that Ezra is almost done with school (one last day to go) I found this little spring-time ‘date’ alone with Zoe to be so much more meaningful. While Ezra was at school, this day could be all about Zoe and her love of animals and her desire to pat a horse or cow daily. You would think this would be hard to come by in the big city, but then I realized Central Park is chalk full of horses feeding by the Plaza Hotel. And only steps away the petting zoo in Central Park has sheep and a fun alpaca to feed. Best of all – I was able to show Zoe the ‘polar bear’s tushy’ (as she likes to call it). I’m not lying when I say I’ve tried FOR YEARS to get Ezra to see this when we visited the zoo … and either the polar bear wouldn’t swim near the glass, or Ezra would grow bored and melt down. Finally I got a shot of the bear’s wonderful feet on the glass – a moment I always wanted to share with a child since it brings the kid out of any viewer when it happens.

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More scenes of Summer Solstice

Ezra’s blue flower sculpture up close, face painting, sun setting by Manhattan, and silent disco.

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Summer Solstice

We spent Wednesday night staying up past the kids’ bedtimes. Socrates Sculpture Park had their annual Summer Solstice Celebration, complete with a silent disco and LOTS of stations where kids could create things from recycled materials. If you look just beneath the 3rd and 4th bubble (from the left) you will see a ‘blue flower sculpture’ just in front of the tree. That’s Ezra’s masterpiece – made of blue plastic bags and book ends. We stayed up waiting for the sun to go down … it wasn’t until 9 p.m. that it started to get a wee bit dark. The kids were exhausted and slept like ya do when it’s summer, and you’ve been outdoors all day long. Bring it on!

This delicious instagram (of Ezra, Mia, Zoe and Lea) is by Ina Seow:

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Moving on up

Ezra had his ‘Moving Up to First Grade’ ceremony the other day. It was a fun session of 3 dance routines that he spent weeks practicing: one to a penguin song, another to a children’s song from Ghana, and the last was a Zumba routine! He was so proud and excited to get ice cream and a blue ribbon for all his hard work (he’s big on trophies and rewards lately.) I can’t believe an entire school year has gone by. It feels like only yesterday that he was starting kindergarten.

He’s sporting a humongous smile after a full day of play at school:

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Father’s Day

Since dad is king we took him to a castle – and of course in NYC that means a trip to The Cloisters. Zoe had Ezra ask the front desk if a prince or princess ever actually lived there. We got to see a garden filled with plants that existed during the Middle Ages (used for medicinal purposes, to eat, and even to dye textiles). The kids gave their dad a rosemary and basil plant because – as Ezra aptly put it on his father’s day card – “mmmm he makes the best food”! E&Z’s dad still prefers to be faceless on this blog (for the most part) but we couldn’t resist a “dad+kids” portrait in this pretty setting. Thanks to Ezra, his face is still mostly a mystery..

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Pre-Father’s Day – Prospect Park

Summer is here!

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The car obsession rages on

We returned to the NYC Police Museum – this time for a vintage police car show that they have every year. We were a tiny bit disappointed that the Batmobile wasn’t there as promised (it left within an hour of the show!) BUT Ezra got to sit in K.I.T.T. from Knight Rider instead! He has no idea what this TV show is – but loved a talking car regardless. The Dukes of Hazard car showed up as well. Have a great weekend!

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