NYC part III

We didn't get to bed until around midnight. I slept in the comfy tempurpedic bed with Jackson and Chris slept on the futon with Madison. They both cried because we were trying to confine them but the were quiet and asleep within a minute. It took me a while to fall asleep and at 12:30 the roommate next to the room we were in came home and we could hear her through the wall which didn't bother me but I was so worried about them waking up in the middle of the night or too early for her. Probably an hour after Jackson falling asleep he started screaming like he was terrified. I looked at him and he was still asleep. I was so sad to think that he could have scary dreams. What could he possibly be dreaming of??  He did the same thing two more times through the night then they both woke up at 7:30. Somehow we got them to go back to sleep until 8:15. It was still too early for the roommates so we tried to entertain them in the room. I had snacks for them and they played with the things in Chris's toilet article kit. 

The thrill of that wore off and Jackson tried to escape the room. He could open the door himself because of the type of doorknob it was and there was no lock. And god forbid we try to stop him from opening it. He would just squeal. Chris ended up playing south park episodes for them on his iphone. We were able to keep them in the room til about 9:30 when Chris went out in the living room and saw that my cousin was awake. So we let them loose but the roommates were still sleeping and we just couldn't get them to be quiet. Even on demand episodes of Mickey didn't work. 

{Watching Mickey}

They were so loud when trying to resist getting dressed that we had to take them upstairs to the top floor where there is a common area to get their clothes on. 

{They liked all of our elevator rides}

We knew we couldn't stay there so we quickly got our stuff together and went for a walk. 

{Trinity Church at the end of Wall Street}

We went to the WTC site which was just a few blocks away. The whole area was blocked off so there wasn't much to see. As we were walking on streets where traffic wasn't allowed anymore I couldn't get a horrific thought out of my head. I was thinking that the people that had to jump from the buildings probably landed right where we were walking. It's hard to be there and not put yourself in the moments of that horrible day. Even as were walking down streets I had the images you see on TV of all the debris billowing up into the air and the pedestrians running. It must have been absolutely horrifying to be there that day.

After that we walked south to Battery Park, caught a glimpse of the Statue of Liberty,

 then made our way back to Wall Street passing the Bull. 

{Self portrait of Maddie and me in front of Tiffany on Wall Street}

By then it was noon so we packed up our stuff and said our goodbyes to Cousin Chris. We walked back to the garage and got our car. Again there was a mishap with the GPS directions and we had precious little gas so we were sweating a little (where do people in Manhattan get gas anyway????). We made it to the Brooklyn Bridge 

and followed the directions to Queens to our friend Ron and Kasha's apartment. We pulled off their exit with zero miles to empty and thankfully a gas station right there. It was great to see Ron and Kasha and Kasha's little sister Victoria. We hung out at their place telling them the woes of how noisy M&J were. They didn't believe us because there they were perfect angels. They kept threatening to steal them. They took us out to a shopping area called Atlas which was so beautiful! We ate at Chili's where our devil children emerged once again. They didn't want the highchair. They didn't want to sit in a lap. They wanted to RUN and be free. 

{Kasha and Victoria}

On the way back to the car we stopped in the middle of the complex outside and ran around a bit and took some pictures. 

{Kasha and Jackson}

{Maddie, Chris, Ron}

We said our goodbyes and headed back to Boston. M&J were asleep 10 minutes into the ride. We left at 6:20 and they slept until 9:45 when we pulled into Nana and Papa's house. Nana 

was heading to California the next morning for the week so she wanted to see them before she left. We hung out there for about 45 minutes then went home. They ended being up til midnight againbut it was ok.

Overall it was a great trip. I think next time we go somewhere we'll stay where we don't care about the kids bothering other people :-)