Quick Trip to NY to Catchup with the Family

With Boston so close to New York, before heading back to Sydney I took a short flight to NY to visit my dear family.

Highlights included:

• Admiring Kai’s school project to create an iconic New York building. Kai selected Citi Field, the building where his #1 baseball team the NY Mets play.  Take a look at the attention to detail – the players on the field, the people in the stands and the score board in the corner.  To compliment the building structure, Kai also created a Baseball Program which included player stats of his favorite Mets players and on the final page his own photo in a NY Mets hat with his baseball stats.

• After visiting the Central Park Zoo with Aila and her parents Yasushi and Cindy, I took Kai and Tyler to the famous toy store from the Tom Hanks movie “Big”, FAO Schwarz, where I did what Aunties to best – spoil my nephews J  Kai selected a Legos Star Wars set that we worked to build together later that evening and Tyler selected this Angry Bird set.

• Enjoying Kalea’s performance in The Velveteen Rabbit, she performed with her jazz troupe and was beautiful smiling and dancing from the front row in front of a very appreciative audience.

• Dinner and drinks at Moto's restaurant with all my cousins, their spouses and brother.   It's been years since I was last at Moto's place and it's really snazzy!  And very popular, there was a waiting line the whole time we were there.  The food was fantastic, as was the sake and the cocktails.  If you're in NY be sure to check out Izakaya Ten (207 10th Ave. between 22nd and 23rd Street) for yummy Japanese home cooking!

• Sight-seeing Delaware with my parents.  After reading an article in National Geographic about Delaware’s first National Park, Papa was keen to visit it and the American painter that was also featured.  We visited Brandywine River Museum where we saw George and Andrew Weymouth’s paintings August and Snow Hill.  Andrew’s most famous painting “Christina’s World” is in the MOMA in New York.  They painted with an unusual medium – egg tempera – that involved using egg yolk and watercolor and resulting in startling detailed paintings and color.

• The Du Pont family built their riches on dynamite but eventually expanded into nylon and other chemicals. We visited a number of Du Pont homes including Hagley Museum and their historic family home “Eleutherian Mills” (E.I. Du Pont, founder), Winterhur Museum and Homes (Henry Francis Du Pont) and Nemours Mansions and Gardens (Home of Alfred I. Du Pont).  The Brandywine River Hotel was very charming and close to many of these Du Pont homes.

• One of the great gardens in the world… Longwood Gardens.  The lily pond had the most intriguing lily pads that looked like very large water platters.  When we saw them, they were still small, but a postcard shows what they would look like later in the Summer.  We stayed in a historic B&B called the Pennsbury Inn that has its own history and beautiful gardens.  Thank you  for planning such a wonderful, relaxing vacation Mom!  I loved staying at the very charming B&Bs you discovered and just spending time together talking and catching up.