Exciting Family Visit

It's been a very fun summer around here. Playing in the water at the pond, a mother daughter day with Fairy Una and the Mermaids in the Forest, violin camp and a couple of lazy days.

My mom and niece arrived from Florida yesterday evening. It's nice that they are here. My mom hates flying and would be happy to live by herself in a cave. Meaning she is a solitary sole. Which is a trait difficult for this social butterfly of a daughter to relate to. I'm excited about getting to know my niece since we haven't spent too much time together.

Thunderstorms rained out our original plans of going to a state park and lazing around pools and carousels. We ended up in the city instead. We went to the NYC Public Library and the girls got the coolest NYC souvenir ever! a NYC Library Card with their photos on them. Best thing is that the entire experience was free. We hung out in the reading room and looked up our family names on the genealogy databases, saw a copy of the Gutenberg's Bible and had a snack on the steps in front of the library. Then we headed downtown on the Subway to the Children's Museum of Art. Stopped at a restaurant that had some fabulous organic and tasty foods on the way. The kids got fabulously messy at the museum. There they were able to do clay sculpting, painting and their favorite the "Ball Pond." The "Pond" consisted of Pilate's balls and padded walls. Basically the kids bounced off the walls and each other to expend some energy.

After we closed the museum we were all ready for a bit of a sweet treat. Cue the fruit sorbets that we happened to find just before getting back onto the subway to head uptown to where we parked the car. It was rush hour and hot and crowded. Grandma and Niece were overwhelmed by the crush of people. My kids were surfing the subway ride away. Upon exiting the subway car in Grand Central Station I hear the word "Evacuate" being screamed and we joined a mass exodus of the station. I grabbed the toddler from the DH and slipped him into the sling grabbed my slow moving and slightly wobbly mother by the hand to help her up the stairs and sent the DH up to find the two girls that were getting swallowed by the merging crowd.

It was amazing how quiet the crowd was. People were making sure that everyone was safe. I never felt afraid of the crowd. Everyone was of the same mind. "Get up to the street."

We found the street and a horrible roaring and hissing sound with smoke coming out of a hole in the ground. The only thing I could compare it to would be a geyser but it wasn't even like that. I'm sure if you watch the news you have seen something of it because we found out later that Grand Central Station and several surrounding building had been evacuated.

We passed a pair of fancy flip flops and broken high heels discarded and left at the edge of the sidewalk and headed towards a growing crowd and many tv news cameras.

Meanwhile my "death and doom" mother is muttering about a terror attack and that the date is such and such. I had to effectively sush her because she was scaring the kids. My newsroom experience came out. I seriously used the word speculating. "Please, mother you are scaring the kids. Stop saying such and such as you are only speculating because you don't know any of the facts."


All I can say is that adrenaline is amazing. I carried a 35 pound toddler and practically lifted my mom up three flights of stairs and through at least three crowded city blocks.

We made it to Times Square, snapped a couple of tourist photos, got the car and drove home. We ended the day with some popcorn phone calls to my Brother (niece's dad) and Dr Seuss stories at bedtime.

A very full and exciting day.