Mother's Day with old/new friends

I mean, seriously, how more irresistible can this family get? Picking fresh lilac and apple tree blossoms for your mom for Mother's Day, cooking the most amazing quiche with decadent local heavy cream and all super local ingredients in your pjs, father and son sneaking old fashions donuts in the brunch (that the moms end up eating first thing with their coffee even if they thought it was not the best idea...), an incredible violin/viola duet made up of two beautiful and incredibly inspiring teenagers, 2 baskets full of the Playmobile farm collection that the girls played with for hours on end, a basket full of Waldorf handwork projects my friend Lisa just finished after 4 years of training that I could touch and examine and try not to drool over... and so much more...

I told you about Lisa before. She sent the girls those beautiful plant-dyed craft kits for Christmas when we were in Arizona. I have known Lisa online for 9 years. I had a file full of Lisa's words of wisdom that I read before going to bed when the girls were little. She was a mentor to me, a friend holding my hand through the intricate World Wide Web... And now, I was meeting her for the very first time, in her beautiful home, and it's just like we had been friends forever. I know it sounds cheezy, but I feel like my whole family fell in love with theirs. It was that great!

Then, Jamie, another friend from the old Waldorf forum, came with her 3 children and celebrated Mother's Day with us and it was so great to connect with her in person too. We had "talked" and exchanged online before and I was really happy to meet her and her sweet partner Brion, and their adorable new addition, Koa.

NYC Day 2: dipping our toes in Central Park, Soho, Little Italy and Chinatown

The next day, we woke up to a bright sunny day and decided to take the ferry to go to NY to really get the best view of the city. Approaching the city by boat made us feel its magnitude.

We then went to explore the area just south of Central Park.

:: Central Park ::

NY felt strangely extremely clean and there were very few beggars and homeless people... to the point that our girls noticed it! They compared it to San José and Montreal and said how much cleaner it was and how they barely saw any homeless people... It is actually kind of weird. It makes you wonder were they all are. My friend Lisa says ex-mayor Giuliani might have deported them all in rougher areas of town...

:: Getting fresh pressed beet, carrots, ginger and spinach juice right on the street! We love NY!! ::

We then went off to discover the Soho neighborhood, mainly a high-end fashion district. We wanted to stop for a bite at Olive's, but when I went in to check the menu on the big blackboard and pointed my camera at it and got yelled "No photo!", we decided against it. Very NY.

 

The next logical district to visit, especially with a grumbling tummy, was Little Italy.

We had gelato and cannoli at Ferrara Bakery and Café, one of the most famous spots in Little Italy.

The South end of Little Italy intermingled with the beginning of Chinatown and that gave rise to a very funny mix of smells...

We were quite excited to have found rambutans for sale, but also quite surprised when we found out about their price (75 cents EACH and no picking said the sign!! Those are the big red hairy litchis... We would get a huge bag of them for $4 in Costa Rica).

When we reached Columbus Park (still in Chinatown), there were many Chinese gatered to play games. Most were playing cards, but some of them were playing Chinese checkers. It was the real thing, not the American version that we know. It was an entirely different game and looked quite complex.

The girls loved New York much more than I expected. I thought they would be too young for it, but they enjoyed the city vibe a lot. On our way back we got to see the Statue of Liberty in the distance. What a great way to say Goodbye to this amazing city...

New York City, Day 1: Times Square and Harlem

After some pondering and researching, we had decided to skip NY this time and save it for another trip simply because it's complicated and expensive to find a campground for our travel trailer close enough (like less than an hour drive) and we thought the girls would enjoy it more later. The only sensible way to visit New York is to stay in town to avoid transiting morning and night (which quickly get costly for the five of us). But on Wednesday afternoon, a suspension leaf broke on our trailer and we had to get it fixed before going any further. We could not go anywhere or we would be causing more damage. As luck had it, we found a garage nearby (in Hackensack) that could order the parts snd do the job for the next day. We could park our truck and trailer in front of the garage where it would be safe to sleep. For free. It was 3 pm on Thursday and we were a mere 20 minute bus ride from the closest NY metro station!

  :: The girls had ridden the subway only once in Montreal when they were little so that was quite exciting. There was lots of discussion about who might live behind the doors in between the stations under the cities and where all those doors might lead... ::

  :: For the full New York effect we got off right at Times Square. The girls were stunned. Aïsha said she never saw such a "decorated" city before. ::

After seeing a French speaking Chinese Spiderman, Sonic, Minnie and Mickey, Bart Simpson and Puss in boots from Shrek, Mathilde spotted a big cookie monster head in a phone booth and we tought it was a pretty funny sight... Then the rest of the monster arrived from Starbucks, coffee in hand, and tried to hide as much as one can in a blue hairy suit, in Times Square, for a bit of a break...

 

  :: Feeling very little in Times Square... ::

 :: Then, we wanted to go to Harlem for dinner to try a restaurant a friend had recommended to us, the Red Rooster, and we were not disappointed. The cornbread with honey butter and tomato jam, the parmesan fries, the maple syrup and Bourbon sauteed collard greens and my smoked trout was to die for!::

  ::And we walked and walked some more and took more subways and inevitably got in the wrong train and ended up in a *very* empty station and found our way back thanks to our amazing navigator. Aïsha was pretty fascinated to watch a woman read an hebrew book beside her in the wagon and recite verses with her eyes closed. And there was the very sexy mama with a baby in a car seat that was quite probably a "him". We finally caught the bus pretty late and when it crossed the brigde back to NJ, we could see the whole city illuminated over the Hudson River and all I could think is how we are some lucky bastards!! Seriously! Things often work so amazingly well for us, it's just incredible! ::