"Rubber Ducky..."

If Sabrina was on Sesame Street she would have to amend the lyrics to "Rubber Ducky" to include sea animals, too! Not to mention the whole duck family....bride, groom, reader and thermometer ducks.

Philadelphia- after DC on the way to New York

Independence Hall where the Declaration of Independence was signed!
This statue was called "Freedom". We heard the story of this lesser known man who was among those who signed the Declaration of Independence and would have been hung for treason had we not won the war. As it was, several of these men had their homes burned to ground by the British.


Randy and Sabrina at the Liberty Bell!

More New York photos

Time Square
Paramount TheaterNew Yorkers get fined $300 for honking their horns. Here is the sign:

Toddler Adventures

The last few days have been full of growing up and exploring adventures. The most painful one is a bout with diaper rash. Thankfully, we discovered that Neoprene is a wonder ointment and things are on a mend. This morning it was noted that Sabrina was drooling a lot so we think another tooth is on the way. (We also are noting that the only time she has been pink with a diaper sensitivity she is also teething... is there a correlation between the two or is this a freak observation? We will have to keep taking data.)

Yesterday, Sabrina crawled up the stairs and then down backwards, with her rear in the air to avoid the rash, several times. She is quick so we must be diligent in watching her because she is definitely determined when she has a destination in mind.

The last few days, Sabrina has decided that being under things is fun. She climbs under the kneeler chair at the desk and looks out. This morning the kitchen stools were the place of investigation. I marvel at her ability to climb over the rungs on the chair to get to the center. For fun, I placed a blanket on the chair for a fort. Evidently, I was the only one who thought this would be fun as she ripped the blanket off to resume play.

This morning the curious side got to Sabrina. When I went to the sink to run hot water over her milk bottle, she decided that she had to see what I was drinking. Thank goodness I put soy milk in my coffee as she took the whole cup and poured it out on the cream colored carpet! When I turned around (and it was only a second I had my back to her) she was shaking the cup to get all of it out. She got a little on her, but since it was just warm, she was not harmed. Lessons we are all learning... drink coffee before Sabrina gets up!

Home for week

Today marks just over a week since we pulled into the driveway of our home! Yesterday, it finally felt like summer with sunshine and temperatures in the 70s! We literally went from wearing our shorts and summer clothes to wearing flannel and fall clothes! However, we know from the drive that Washington is not the only state with rainy conditions. Nebraska was in a deluge and flooding in places when we drove through and other states had thick black clouds.

Sabrina is loving being home and exploring the condo. She loves seeing new toys she did not know she had and she loves crawling up and sometimes down stairs. The new found open space has been a delight for her! We intend to post pictures on the blog, so in the next few days, please check out the pictures we will be adding to the old posts from the trip!

Howdy from Everett

The last few days of driving were beautiful! We traveled through the Grand Tetons to Yellowstone (saw Old Faithful blow) and then the next day we trekked on from West Yellowstone to Everett, Washington. Our original plan was to stop in Idaho or Spokane, Washington but as the trip went on, we like horses headed toward a barn, got the bug to just get home.

Wyoming and Montana were beautiful state. My plan was to continue quilting

, but I just couldn't do it as we were surrounded by rugged mountains, streams and a variety of wildlife. Our wildlife sightings included buffalo (bison), antelope, eagle, osprey, black winged black birds, pronghorned antelope, and ram sheep. Fishermen were abundant in the streams, flyfishing. We decided we might like to take a family vacation some day back to thi

s area when Sabrina is older.

Idaho was beautiful also, but since we crossed the panhandle, we didn't see too much of it. The West and Pacific Northwest offered clear crisp air to breathe! Refreshing. The temperatures varied from in the 70s down to low 40s where we could see snow in the mountains around

us!

Once we passed through the Cascades in Washington, a dark cloud and rain started. So far, it has been drizzling and cool with an afternoon break of sunshine. We are hoping to have more sunshine soon so we can take care of the weeds in the yard.

From Cowboy land to the Grand Tetons

Yesterday, our drive through Nebraska involved lots of grassy plains, rolling hills and rain. The weather forecast predicted flooding and maybe possible tornado winds near where we stayed in Lincoln, Nebraska but thankfully we did not experience the severe weather. Last night we stayed in Casper, Wyoming and struggled to find a place to stay as there was a rodeo in town. The cowboys as it turned out were noisy in our hotel...making all sorts of noise at 2 and 3 am. So as it was, we did not sleep well. Oh, well. there is coffee for these types of days.

Our

drive through Wyoming was the most scenic drive we have had! We enjoyed watching for wildlife and saw many groups of antelope. Then we entered the higher elevations to the base of the Tetons and were in awe of their majestic heights and rugged edges! We found everything around us with a light dusting of snow and quickly remembered that we have not been in cold temperatures for

a while so this might take a little getting used to. Our destination for the night is Jackson, Wyoming which is a resort town for skiing in the winter and white water

rafting in the summer. This evening we had burgers and strolled along the western decorated town. Overall, we are enjoying this evening and a chance to stretch our legs!

From Hoosier to Corn Husker

Last night we spent the night in the home of the Indian Hoosiers. Tonight we are in Lincoln, Nebraska...home of the Corn Huskers! It was a long trip of over 600 miles but we all survived. The day started early in Indiana and by noon we had passed state lines into Illinois. What beautiful farm land. West we continued in to Missouri. Missouri was full of truck drivers and construction! We even experienced some heavy rain. At Kansas City border we veered north toward Iowa and drove parallel to the river. After nine miles in Iowa, we crossed over into Nebraska. By this time all three of us were desperate to get out of the car and walk around.

Sabrina has been a trooper traveler. She has quietly been playing Peek A Boo with her blanket or lecturing Winnie the Pooh or Snoopy or both. She even has been "reading" books to herself and giggling! We are so blessed!

Blast to the Past

Randy and I had to detour to Bloomington, Indiana to see the town of one of our favorite movies, BREAKING AWAY. This movie was inspirational to us as we trained for the 500 mile bike tour on our tandem a couple of years ago. After finding a hotel, we ate pizza and then walked around the town. We saw some of the older buildings that were made with great limestone columns. The aging showed on some of the carvings and had worn away the stone.

Right down the street from where we ate dinner was the archway to the university. It was impressive how the designers had incorporated paths and forested trees right in

to the layout between the buildings. In the basement of the Memorial Union was the bowling alley and cafeteria which held famous scenes in the movie. On a bulletin board were pictures from the movie. Guess we aren't the only ones to come to town to see where this movie was filmed.

Who turned off the heat?

For nine months we have been pretty warm. Sometimes too warm. While in NY the temperatures went from 90 to 50. Guess who has warm clothing packed in middle of the duffle bag that can't be reached? In our summer clothing: sun dress for me and shorts for Randy, we drove through several states. Starting in New Jersey it was cloudy and about 55. Then we hit the mountain ranges and it started pouring down rain.

Pennsylvania was our next state to cross. Beautiful fa

rms with green grass and trees. Looked a lot like Oregon. We know why it was so green. It rained the entire state. We re-entered New York so we could go to Niagara Falls. We knew we were in New York because we had to pay more tolls. And again we paid at N

iagara Falls Bridge. To date we have paid $24 in tolls. Eek!

Niagara Falls was really impressive: cold, but impressive. We were blessed with a break in the rain but it was a little foggy so the visability was not as it could have been. After forever in the car, it felt wonderful to get out and stretch our legs.

Back in the car through Buffalo, NY and onto Erie, PA. We missed the hotel turn off. Good thing we did not have reservations! So, on to Ohio! Don't ask me the name of the town, but

it is along I-90 ourside of a large city. The beds felt wonderful and sleep was much needed. Our drive today will be a little shorter than planned but still will be over 400 miles. To Indiana!

Tour Guides make a difference

Today we started our adventure taking the Path to 33rd Street and then stopping for coffee at the Empire State Building. We sipped our coffee and walked around the shops in the interior hallway but decided not to go to the top. Yesterday's view from the Top of the Rock was so spectacular we figured we saw a better view than from the Empire State Building. From there we hopped on our tour bus to Little Italy and found some good pasta. The seasoning was fresh and the best I have ever tasted! Randy too!

From there, we walked to Ground Zero. I

t was hard to see over the fence but we did see into the area fr

om the Episcopal

Church across the street. The miraculous detail of this old church is that it did not suffer even a scratch from the 911 attack on the Trade C

enter. It became a center for healing and aide to the firemen and police who were helping clean up 911. We arrived just as they tolled the bell for the memorial fireman service that they have daily. Amazing to see the church

which was probab

ly as old as some of the churches in Charleston still standing.

We were excited to reunite on the next bus with our guide from yesterday morning. He was really good. The four we had between him were not good...either they did not have the history of New York down or they had super thick foreign accents and we could not un

derstand them. Dominque was great! He knew the history of New York and new the best shops and restaurants and really gave newby tourists such as us a tour and ideas of things to see in the city. At Central Park we got off the bus and walked a d

ifferent section of the park.

When we got back on the bus, we took a tour of Harlem. We drove by John Lennon's, Jerry Seinfield's, Michael Douglas' apart

ments and also places that have been cleaned up. Grant's Tomb was an impressive sight. We saw the coveted brown houses and then we saw the really wealthy east side of Central Park where the mayor and Jackie O live or once lived. If we had more time, we would have loved to

have stopped at the Met or Natural Museum of Science. Our tour guide for the Uptown Tour was Pam and she also was funny and brought a lot to the tour experience. Tour guides make a difference.

We got off our bus in Time Square and then returned home via the Path after we stopped for a slice of pizza! Yummy!

"New York, New York, What a wonderful town..."

All through the day, the lyrics from ON THE TOWN played through my head. In fact, we found ourselves quoting certain lines from the movie.

We thought that we were busy in DC and that was true, but we not only walked but had to navigate our ways down the streets of a huge city where at first everything just looks like a big skysc

raper. Lucky for us, Randy had purchased for us tickets on the double decker tour bus and we were able to ride it down to the Statue of Liberty/ Ellis Island area. The tour guid

e was pretty funny and had lots of information to share on the bus as we passed buildings. Lines were not too big and we got onto the ferry boat in reasonable time.

When we hopped back on the tour bus, we had a different guide and he wasn't as funny. Our next stop was the United Nation. Very Impressive building with all the flags outside. The sculpture of a bent gun shaft was very symbolic of the purpose of the UN. From there were found some lunch and sat down. When we walked back to catch the next bus, we had to wait a long time. This time we had to sit on the bottom section and ride backwards which was not fun, so we opted to get off at the old Astor Hotel. This was super luxurious and the display of the old clock in the lobby was fabulous. A few blocks from there and we were at Rockerfeller Center. Riding the elevator to the top was stomach dropping. The elevator moved quickly and there was a light show on the ceiling of the comp

artment. From the viewing decks, the view was specacular. I think this was close to one of the tallest buildings. We could overlook Central Park on one side and Empire State Buidling on the other.

Once we descended, our decision was

to walk to Central Park to where John Lennon lived. What a gorgeous building! The decoration on the exterior was fabulou

s with iron work and decorated stones. Across the street was a park in Lennon's memory called Strawberry Field which had "Imagine" in a circular pattern on the walkway where people had placed flowers. One man played his guitar and sang. Others sat in silence on benches. One crazy guy kept turning on his boom box with CCR music and ticking people off.

On our walk back to Times Sq

uare we stopped at Carnigie Deli for dinner. The sandwiches were insanely huge! Meat was piled on 3-5 inches thick betweene two dinky slices of bread! Needless to say, we brought most of it home. We did however, save room for a slice of NY cheesecake from Lindy's. This gave us the energy to walk the long way back to catch the Path subway back to Jersey City. Our day started with leaving at 7:30am and ended with arriving back after 10pm. Sabrina was a trooper! We all quickly fell asleep!

Another super busy day!

Today, we took in more of the city with strategy! First, we started at Archives and saw the Declaration of Independence, Bill of Rights and Articles of Confederation along with other important documents. We were glad to be there early enough to beat the crowds! There was walk for the cure of cancer which brought 50,000+ people to the city and once they were done and cleaned up, things really filled up.

Next on our list was lunch in the cafeteria of the Art Smithsonian. We loved the waterfall by the cafeteria which connected the East and West buildings. It was a quiet and comfortable place to spend the afternoon. Not until we were looking at Cezanne, Monet, and Van Gogh

pieces did the crowds pick up but even then it was not bad.

Last on our list was the US History Smithsonian. I liked the First Lady gown section and Randy enjoyed seeing the ruby slippers and Kermit the Frog! On our way home we discussed how much this museum had changed since we had last been in at least ten years.

Overall, our favorite Smithsonian was the Natural History Museum with the mineral

and gem exhibit. The tour of the Capital and the Library of Congress were also high on the lists. We are hoping to swing by the Memorials for Jefferson and FDR on our way out of town tomorrow.

Just one more place, while we are here!

Yesterday, we tired ourselves out! It started with spending the morning at the Air and Space Museum at 10am. Randy really enjoyed this museum and reading about and looking (touching when possible) the airplance and space crafts. Amazing how many people can fit in this museum as many school trips descended on the museum at the same time. No food nor drinks were allowed in the museum so while in the baby changing room we fed Sabrina a little bit so we could continue.

From there we hiked

up to the Capital Building. At first we didn't see anyone but then a guard told us we could tour the Ca

pital by taking an elevator down and then passing security to go into the building. We had

a nice tour of the

rotunda, Hall of Statues and an area where caskets were displayed before presidents were ta

ken to the cemetary.

From there, we took the underground tunnel to the Library of Congress! F

abulous interior! Intricate paintings and carvings. Before leaving we saw Jefferson's library collection and Gershwin's piano!

At this point everyone was starving so we beelined to the cafeteria in the Natural history Museum. My favorite section was on rocks and minerals! Randy liked it,too but also liked the dinosaurs. At 7:30 the guards kicked everyone out and we strolled home to get off ou

r feet and get ready for bed.