Sweet idea

I must say that I stole this idea from a truly amazing woman at church named Ellen.  She gave Emily one of these for graduation and I made 8 of them to give to Emily's friends.

Super easy to make: the sundae cup,shredded paper, and plastic spoon are from the dollar store.  I had to buy the paper because my shredder is a cross cut so it just gives you confetti.  The gift card is for $10.00 to the Dairy Queen.  You wrap it up in a clear gift bag that you can get just about any where.  The total per gift is under $12.00.

Wrap up

Our trip to Pennsylvania was really fun.  We got to see some historical things in Philadelphia and amazing things in New York City.  The purpose of the trip was to visit with my rockin awesome cousin Carolyn and her family.  Her husband Eric got us out of a pickle on the way there when Rob was so very sick.  Her three daughters were so fun and made the trip all that much more fun.  We were able to drive my aunt Jeanette, who is from Utah, from Detroit to visit with her daughter and grand kids.  I was enjoying myself so much that I forgot to snap a bunch of pictures while we stayed with them.  This is Rob and Eva watching cartoons early one morning while they waited for the rest of us to get moving.  She called him grandpa all week.  We sure love them all and can't wait to see them next summer in Utah when their oldest is baptized.

Philadelphia :(

We spent a day in Philadelphia and I was sorta disappointed.  We knew the things we wanted to do and the order we wanted to do them in.  We only have ourselves to blame because we didn't do one last check online to verify our information.  We started at Betsy Ross' house that charges a "recommended donation" of $5.00 per person.  When we found out that you had to make the donation to enter we left.  We then went over to the U.S. Mint.  I will say that this was the most interesting part of our day.  You are not allowed to take pictures inside but this place was full of information and fun facts that we took over an hour to get through it.  You actually get to see coins being made.

We also went to the Federal Reserve for a Money Matters exhibit that was OK.  We thought it was interesting that at one of these two places Emily showed them her insulin pump and she was waved around the metal detector and the other place made her take it off and then wanded her.  Crazy.

We finally made our way over to Independence Square and quickly found out that if you didn't get your ticket for Independence Hall at the crack of dawn you don't get one.  What the what!!!  So this picture is all we have of it.  We wanted to see the Liberty Bell but you have to wait in an hour long line to get in.  The line never did go down even at closing time there was a long line.  If you look in the above picture to the right you can see the line for the Liberty Bell.  What we found out is that you have to weave through a bunch of exhibits before getting to see the bell and if people take forever doing this everyone else has to wait.  They only allow so many people in the building at a time.  I found a solution to our problem.  I pulled a trick out of the bag of tricks Rob's dad used on family vacations, "Hey kids, Look!"  We were able to see the bell through the side window.

I have no clue who's butt that is but I am glad he moved just enough that I could get this picture.

The only thing we were able to do was to see these guys act out a declaration and that was while we were waiting to go in Congress Hall.

This is in Congress Hall and that chair is the chair that Thomas Jefferson sat in.  I took other pictures but I won't bore you with them.  Go waste your own day learning. :p

Emily took this picture from our parking space.  I like it!  We also went to the B. Free Post Office which is supposedly a landmark and found that it was just a real working post office.  How lame!

Things I found interesting enough to take a picture of

The windows in Grand Central Station

 

 

The light fixture in the market.

 

 

A clock on 5th ave.

 

 

These guys just crack me up.

 

 

My amazing daughter sending LOVE.

 

 

The decoration on the gate to the carousel in Central park.

Places to go...

I was trying to decide how to post our trip to New York and I came up with the old saying "I've got places to go, people to see and things to do."  So that is how I am sharing our trip.  Places to go: The Chrysler building

Grand Central Station who is celebrating 100 years.

The public library.  We came across this by accident but it is a beautiful building.

Rockefeller Center

Did you know that the famed ice rink is transformed into a cafe during the summer?  We didn't.

NBC studios

Central park.  It's cool to be in a park with the hustle and bustle of kids playing, carriage rides, ball games and every type of person but you can still see the city.

Carnegie hall

 

Radio City Music Hall

 

And of course, Time Square.  What an amazing day we had exploring the city.

People to see...

In New York City there are so many people to see.  In Grand Central Station you can see so many different nationalities, tourist and business people grabbing lunch.

If your mom really really loves you she will call months in advance to get tickets to your favorite late night show.  I guess these three didn't have a mom who thought that far in advance so they had to settle with a picture in front of his marquee.

I know it is wrong to take a picture in a public bathroom but this lady was sporting a TAIL!  She caught me taking the picture and gave me discount tickets to the dinosaur exhibit in the park.

Time square is full of loonies dressed up in all kinds of costumes.  You are expected to "tip" these dorks if you take a picture with them.  So I just took a picture OF them.  Wonder Woman, Hello Kitty,the Hulk, the naked cowboy and sadly a 80 year old woman walking around in a bikini bottom with her hair covering her chest as the naked cowgirl.

Time Square is truly a melting pot.

This guy was just sitting as still as a statue.  We almost walked right by until he moved to light his cigarette.

You can even find Mike Wazowski.

Things to do

While in New York City there are many things to do.  You can grab lunch at Grand Central Station and bite into a garlic dill pickle and make this sort of face.  We didn't know they were garlic.

You can ride one of the many subway trains.  If you are lucky you will walk past what appears to be an empty station and have the train come in and blow it's horn.  You will then be what everyone is laughing at because you yelp and jump at the unexpected sound.

You can stand on any street and count the vast amount of yellow cabs.

You can admire or count all of the flags around Rockefeller Center.

You can sit in Central park on a hot day and enjoy an ice cream with your peeps.

You can walk block after block and enjoy the beautiful architecture.