Residence Inn by Marriott Times Square

Here is Gwen's hotel family in beautiful Mid-Town Manhattan. 46 floors (357 suites and 93 condos) and a wonderful staff of over 100 people.

November 2008

Joel's parents, Jim and Dee Dee came to visit for a week over Thanksgiving. We had a wonderful time showing them our favorite places and some new places in NYC and by our house. On Monday December 1, Dagny performed at the High School for her first Chorus concert. She was very excited that her grandparents were here to see her sing.


The second half of of the week of the Lytle's visit, we spent time at our house and explored the Hudson River Valley by our house in Monroe. Below is Joel and Jim in front of Boscobel "Federalist Style architecture" Mansion across the Hudson River from West Point Military Academy. It is an amazing historical home with a great view of the river and the Academy. Joel also showed his parents West Point. Joel and Jim went to Hyde Park to see the Vanderbuilt Mansion and Franklin D Roosevelt's home, while Dee Dee, Gwen and the kids went to the Woodbury Commons Premium Outlet mall.




On Thanksgiving we had a front row view of the Macy's Thanksgiving Parade - right across from Macy's on 34th Street. Below is a picture of the opening cheerleader performance of the parade from where we were standing. It was only 40 degrees - much colder than last year when it was 60 degrees. We had a very New York Thanksgiving of going to the parade, eating dinner in a restaurant, and Joel, Jim and Dee Dee went to Chicago on Broadway and Gwen and the kids went to see the movie Bolt. Tuesday Jim and Dee Dee went to see the Rocketts and Radio City Music Hall and our family joined them (after a record long commute of two and a half hours) that evening to see Irving Berlin's White Christmas Musical at the Marquis Theater - it is definitely one of our favorite musicals!

On Wednesday - the day before Thanksgiving - we went to the Intrepid Sea, Air and Space Museum on Pier 86. It is on an Air Craft Carrier. We saw and amazing collection of Naval history of the Intrepid. It has been under renovation for a couple of years and just reopened on November 8. President Bush, astronauts, and retired Navy were there on Veteran's Day to celebrate to re-opening.

Below is our second annual holiday dress fashion show at the Largest Department Store in the USA - Macy's on 34th Street. The girls tried on several dresses and then each selected one.

NYC or BUST June 2008

Roadtrip From Boise, Idaho to Monroe, New York (2,800 miles)

And the adventure begins...

Thursday June 5, 2008

Joel picked up the kids from school and headed to Montana - stopping in Pocatello to visit Grandma Gibson at Buddy's so Joel could enjoy one last bowl of his favorite salad.

Devil's Tower (National Park), Wyoming

Custer's Last Stand, Montana

Mount Rushmore (National Park), South Dakota

Indoor waterpark in Rapid City, South Dakota

In Chicago, Illinois - visited the Shedd Aquarium and Field Museum

Gettysburg, Pennsylvania (National Park)

June 11, 2008 the family is reunited to live in New York.

Maine Trip - June 2008

The family is finally together again and we were off to Maine for a week. We traded our timeshare week for somewhere close to our new home. Our "home base" was in Bethel, Maine which is close to New Hampshire and Vermont.

You can't go through Vermont without going to a Maple Syrup Factory...

We took a day trip to the coast of Maine to visit Acadia National Park (and get our stamp). It was a beautiful park and we enjoyed playing in the Atlantic Ocean (it is cold, but that didn't stap the kids from playing in the water. We stayed the night in Bar Harbor after exploring Acadia.

The Maine state capitol building in Augusta...

We took a high speed CAT ferry to Nova Scotia Canada. It got us from Bar Harbor, Maine to Nova Scotia in less than three hours (half the time of a typical ferry). We did a day bus tour of Nova Scotia and went back to Maine the same day. We learned about catching lobster on our tour - it worked the kids caught lobsters.

Lobster boats in Nova Scotia....

Yes - a snowman in June... We went to Santa's Village amusement park in New Hampshire. There were not many people there (school was still in session in the East Coast). All the rides were Christmas themed. We were singing Christmas songs all day - wow!

We went to Quebec City in Canada for a night. The city was celebrating their 400 years of settlement. There were all sorts of festivities happening in the city. They did a film, light and music presentation on these large silos across the St Lawrence River - amazing. The historic city is surrounded by a fortified wall. The city is very European in feel and most people spoke French. We definately need to go back to Quebec!

The streets of Quebec on a perfect sunny day...

St Gauden's home (National Park) is a historic artist's colony. St Gauden is the sculpturer that created the Lincoln statue at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington DC and also created to double eagle gold dollar coin.

This is the home on the National Park Estate of Marsh - Billings - Rockefeller. The park is dedicated to conservations and preservation of natural resources. It is a beautiful and informative estate.

We visited Joseph Smith's birth place in Sheridan, Vermont. The monument is an amazing one piece of granite that is 32-1/2 feet tall (one foot for every year Joseph Smith lived). It is a very breath taking area.

July 2008

HAPPY FATHER'S DAY DADDY!!!

For Father's Day we bought Daddy tickets for the family to go to a Yankees vs Rangers Baseball game. Joel is a huge Yankees fan and we had to go to a game in the "House that Babe Ruth built..." before they tear it down at the end of the season. The girls also needed a Major League experience. They had so much fun singing and chanting and eating a hot dog and junk food. Tessa loves eating the roasted peanuts and throwing the shells on the floor. Dagny enjoyed the cheer "Here we go Jeter, here we go!" As this was her first Yankees experience she did not know who Derek Jeter was and was saying, "Here we go Cheater, here we go." We got that corrected, so she will not be beat up...

The new Yankee Stadium under construction...

Grandma Becky visited us for two and a half weeks in July - It was so nice to have her stay with us. You would think she would be tired of the family after them living in her house for three month, prior to moving...

We went to Hyde Park, NY to get our National Park Stamps for the Franklin D Roosevelt sites and the Vanderbilt Mansion - both overlooking the Hudson River.

Below is Val kill. The house that Eleanor Roosevelt lived in until she passed away. She had FDR build her a cottage away from his mother's estate. They helped create jobs and skills for furniture builders to build furniture here. There are several pieces of the furniture in the home.


Behind us is the first Presidential Library that was created by FDR, on his family estate in Hyde Park.

Below is the Vanderbilt mansion. This is an example of "new" money or Nouveau Rich versus the old money of the Roosevelts in the area - the two groups did not care for each other.

We also got our National Park stamp at Weir Farm in Connecticut. It is an artist colony. There were three generations of artists that lived on this farm and enjoyed being inspired by Nature for their art. The Weir oldest daughter married a grandson of Brigham Young who was a sculpturer, who created the "This is the Place" Monument in Salt Lake City and the 32-1/2 foot granite monument at Joseph Smith's birthplace in Vermont. Some of his sculptures are still in his shop at the farm.

The farm provides art supplies, so you can borrow the supplies, be inspired by nature and draw and paint.

The farm house at Weir Farm.

Dagny with Miley Cyrus (over Dagny's right sholder with the sanding Microphone).

Miley performed for free for Good Morning America at Bryant Park which is right across from the hotel. We were able to get VIP passes and get up close to see her.

While Grandma Becky was staying with us, Robbin, Josh and Avery also came to visit. We went to Coney Island, before they tear it down at the end of the season. It was a bit scary (the hotel staff were shocked we went there). We went early before it was too crowded and scary. The water was dirty and there was a lot of broken glass on the beach. The amusement park is old, expensive and each ride is separately owned, so you have to pay individually for each ride. They Cyclone roller coaster was $8/ride - wow! The kids only went on it once... and two other rides and then we were poor! Then we had an original Coney Dog at Nathan's.

Grandma and the grandkids at Astroland amusement park at the Famous Coney Island.

Once a quarter, Gwen is Manager on duty and the family stays at the hotel for the weekend. It is fun to go to the city and explore. The girls brought their American Girl dolls and we went to the American Girl Place (store) for dinner. They have a great restaurant with seats and dishes for the dolls to enjoy the meal together.

From June to October 2008 there was an art exhibit of four man made waterfalls. They were incredible. Below is a picture of the girls with the sign about the Waterfalls and over Tessa's right shoulder is one of the New York Waterfalls under the Brooklyn bridge. Behind them is Brooklyn. We are on the Manhattan side of the East River.

Here we are at the South Street Seaport. Behind us is the Brooklyn bridge and over Gwen's left shoulder is a "waterfall".

August 2008

HAPPY 7th BIRTHDAY TESSA!!!

Thursday August 14, 2008

Tessa was very concerned about celebrating her birthday without all her Idaho friends and cousins to have a big party as she has had for past birthdays. It is uncertain if she was more concerned about no big party or that she would not get as many presents... So this year the focus was on Quantity of presents and not the Quality of the presents. Luckily wonderful folks from Idaho sent lots of little gifts to her and with the gifts from mom, dad & sister - she was spoiled - as always.

Mommy took Tessa's birthday off from work and we had presents and home made breakfast on the patio. Then we got in the car and drove an hour and a half to Eaton, Pennsylvania to the Crayola Factory for the day. The Factory was heaven for Tessa and Dagny - tons of arts and crafts projects. We were there until they closed. Below is the world's largest Crayon. Then we went to Friendly's for dinner and ice cream. It was a great birthday - even without the big party.

West Point Military Academy is 14 miles from our house. The campus is immaculately groomed with amazing buildings and an incredible view of the Hudson River. Below is pieces of the chain that stretched across the Hudson River (just under the waterline) to keep the British Ships from sailing up the Hudson to New England during the Revolutionary War. There are thirteen of the original links at West Point commemorating the original thirteen colonies.

The West Point Museum is the largest Army and History of War museum in the United States. The beautiful museum building is pictured below.

Every Sunday in the summers the Army band performs outside a West Point. Their band is not made up of cadets. They are professional musicians that have Masters and Doctorates in music. We went to their last concert - Labor Day weekend. We brought our blanket and picnic dinner and sat on the lawn and enjoyed the concert. Every American should attend this show - it was so powerful! They started with Big Band music, then the full orchestra came out and played Broadway favorite. They finished the performance with patriotic songs, including the Overture of 1812 (with real cannon fire - of course) and Stars and Stripes Forever with the backdrop of fireworks over the Hudson. Definitely a night to remember!

September 2008

Our family has been exploring the historic mansions of the the Hudson River Valley. The range in age from the early 1700's to the early 1900's. They all have amazing views of the Hudson and have beautiful gardens - like the one below at Olana.
Below is Olana. It is the home of Fredick Church, a famous landscape painter that studied from Thomas Cole in the "Hudson School" style. There is a lot of Persian style in the architechture of the home - influenced by his travels to the Middle East. There were many great peices of art in the home - besides the home itself.

Below is the girls on their first day of school in New York on September 3, 2008. Dagny is starting 4th grade in Mr. Schifano's class and Tessa is starting 2nd grade in Mrs. Hoover's class. They are standing in front of our house. Daddy is very proud of his flag :) The girls are excited to ride the school bus for the first time going to and from school.

Joel's Aunt Charlene and Uncle Tom came to visit us. They stayed at our house for a night and then we moved into the city. They had never been to NYC before. We only had a day and a half to see the city. We went to Grease on Broadway and took the Grayline double-decker bus on the uptown and downtown loop. It was a great overview of the city (below we are on the bus with Times Square behind us). We also went on the Circle Line Cruise around the Statue of Liberty. The art exhibit "the New York Waterfalls" were in the river (four of them) when we took the tour. We love having visitors now that we are so far away!

Below is Sunnyside Manor on the Hudson. It is Washington Irving's home. He is the author of Legend of Sleepy Hallow and Rip Van Winkle. This house is only a few miles from Sleepy Hallow. We spent the day here at the Children's book day. There were over sixty children's authors and illustrators at the event to autograph the books. What an incredible event!

Dagny (and Cozy Bear) with one of the many tents of authors at the Children's Book Day at Sunnyside Manor.

The girls are with Susan Jeffers, author and illustrator of My Chincoteague Pony and many other beautiful books.

Dagny and Tessa with Bunnicula with the book in hand...