The Biggest Tree in NYC

Do you like my 1940's hat-inspired hair?!  W said it was wild. I got a lot of double takes from onlookers. :)

When the kids got out of school they were tired and were depressed when I told them we were going somewhere. But I did not pay them heed, because I needed desperately to go somewhere.  So we got some snacks and headed into Manhattan. All I told the kids was that where we were going was a surprise.

The kids and I made a trip to the Rockafeller Center Tree and Swarovski Crystal star.

We also went to the Paley Center for Media and watched our own movies for 35 minutes.  I thought they would have many more television artifacts to see, but they had all the shows from TV from the beginning of television. They have an awesome theater in the basement.

I got to watch The Scarecrow and Mrs. King from 1983; once one of my mother's favorite television shows and now I can understand why--the premise is about a homemaker that has three children, I think, and she gets wrapped up into a spy scheme and becomes the eventual partner of a spy.  The thing I like about her is that though she is trying hard to be a good mother, her children are not angels--they act like normal kids and she acts like a normal frazzled mother (it's free to watch with Amazon Prime). 

We got in free with the Cool Culture Pass that is given to Universal Pre-Kidnergartens in NYC that gives access to 90 museums in NYC, including the Intrepid ($28 per person) and the Guggenheim.   We are planning on doing all sorts of really fun things through the break.  This time we saved $25.

Then, one of the restaurants that a person I respect suggested Carnegie Deli.  She suggested the pastrami sandwich and the pickles--ends up being $18.95.  She also suggested the cheesecake--which at $10 a piece, pretax, I was more skeptical to try, especially since cheesecake is not my favorite.  The sandwich was good, but did not agree with my prego stomach.  I hope cooked/warmed pastrami is okay to eat when prego.

One of the best things that I loved about this journey was that the kids kept asking for stories where the baby in my tummy was already born.  They really want to know if I think the dear is a girl or a boy, but I really have no idea, but will be happy either way. Their delight in talking as if the baby was already here just made me feel happy and proud.

The story today included us on the train when all the sudden the train kept going back 20 years and all the passengers except us changed--but our clothes and accccessories changed to fit the times, then when it got to the 1940's Fred Astair walked on board and so did a 24 piece orchestra.  The orchestra played and Mr. Astaire started dancing and invited the kidlets to join him, which they did; except for the baby.  Then all the sudden the car pushed straight up into the air and up through the floor of a stage of one of the premier Broadway theaters of the time.  Whereupon the sides of the train pulled open like an Easter egg and 65 other dancers came dancing onto the stage and we all danced off the train--then a tyrannosaurus-rex roared offstage and began to walk out onto the stage.  I pulled my kids out of the theater really fast onto the 1940s NYC street and a couple of the Orchestra members found us and told us that as soon as they figured out how to get the dinosaur back to it's own time, they would help us get back to 2013 (after the baby is born).  At this point T was a little worried and had me change the story to we were all hope safe, especially the baby, back in our apartment; waking up from a funny dream. 

Also, it really helped to tell them it was all a surprise, the whole time, because then they weren't disappointed or whiny about where we were going, they were just surprised. Goal of the whole break--make all outings a surprise!