Sunday, February 17, 2008

Fun Visit!





Birgitta and Julia arrived from Columbus, Ohio, on Friday, Feb 15th, to visit us for the weekend. Julia is 6 years old and interested in becoming a spy. She and Ella enjoyed playing together as soon as we got back home.
Julia was thrilled to see the Statue of Liberty from the plane as it approached La Guardia airport to land, and over the moon to discover that she could see Lady Liberty from our bedroom window and the roof of our condo as well (pictured).
Friday afternoon we went for a walk around Park Slope that included a brief stop at the Superhero Store (closed for the weekend!) and a toy store, where Julia picked up a practical joke toy: a can of peanuts that when opened, causes a plastic snake to pop out. When we got home, Julia asked Michael to help her open her new can of peanuts, and he was genuinely startled! She was thrilled that the joke worked.
Saturday, we went to China Town where we saw many colorful paper lanterns hanging between buildings and trees in honor of the Chinese New Year, and visited a famous donut shop called "Doughnut Plant" to sample the donuts. We took a subway to Times Square to visit the Swatch store so Julia could get her first wristwatch and a souvenir shop to buy some mementos of the trip including a lot of Statue of Liberty paraphernalia. We ate lunch at Chevy's -- reliving an old tradition that Birgitta and I used to have in Silicon Valley -- and visited the Hersheys and M&M "super" stores. Ella accompanied us the whole day and was a happy camper, chattering in her stroller, and finishing an entire jar of pureed pear at lunchtime. Michael picked us up around 430 pm in the afternoon, and it was great to get a ride home.
Saturday night, we made a deal that Julia would babysit Ella for $1, and Michael would babysit Julia so Birgitta and I could go out for dinner. We had a great meal at Sidecar, just around the corner from our condo.
Today we bought bagels for breakfast and drove Birgitta and Julia to the airport to fly home. Next visit it will be our turn to go to Columbus, unless we can arrange to rendezvous in California this summer!

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