Gulfarium

Easton went on a boys outing with Nathan and his dad.  I decided to take the rest of the kids to the local aquarium.  Dyer hadn't been yet and had been asking for a while now so I thought I would take him.

These are random people but the kids and I got to hold these birds.  They wouldn't let us take a picture of the birds when they were placed on anyone.  Probably because they wanted you to pay for the pictures they were taking.

Dolphin show

We happened to go during shark week so the kids were able to do a scavenger hunt and get shark teeth once they filled out their paper.

Gator!  Luckily we haven't seen a gator this big in our backyard.

Firefighter visit

For play group the firefighters came to visit and let the kids explore the fire truck.

Dyer's 5th birthday!

Dyer of course had a great birthday since Valerie was in town and they got to spend a few days at the castle hotel swimming all day long.  It doesn't get much better than that!

Two of Dyer's favorites: Darth Vader shirt and Batman mask!

Thanks Gma Whiting!

Power Ranger Dino Charge!  "I get one just like Easton!" 

Thanks Grandma Gretch!

Dyer also got money from Grandpa and Grandma Whiting and Aunt Kim and Uncle Merlin.  Thank you to everyone who made his day extra special!

New York

June 9th:

Liberty Island and Ellis Island:

 National 9/11 Memorial and Museum:

One World Trade Center:

We rode an elevator to the top (over 100 floors) in less than a minute.  It was crazy how fast it takes you up.  Once we were at the top you could feel the building swaying.

Empire State Building

Manhattan bridge and Brooklyn bridge

Liberty Island and Ellis Island

Beautiful sunset

It was neat to see the sunset but as soon as the sun went down I wasn't able to take pictures without there being a glare/reflection on the window.

June 10th:

Grand Central Station

New York library 

(we actually went inside the first day we got into town but I got a better picture this day as we walked past it).

Rockefeller Center

Catholic church we toured.  I thought it was a little strange that they let people in to tour the building when a funeral was going on.  It was a really pretty building though.

Biking around Central park

Belvedere Castle 

View from Belvedere Castle

Walking across Brooklyn Bridge

Grimaldi's Pizza

We planned on eating here, but then Nathan decided he wanted to try his daughter's pizza place since it was just a couple buildings down.

Juliana's Pizza

Brooklyn bridge

One World Trade Center

June 11th: 

Happy Birthday to me!

Bronx Zoo

These otters made me think and miss my kids.  There were four of them that were fighting/playing tag with each other.

We also went to the temple and then we went to see the Fiddler on the Roof

June 12th:

Flatiron Building

We went to Flatbush for church.  Nathan wanted to go back to his mission stopping grounds and hopefully see one of his investigators who got baptized.  We lucked out and actually saw him.  It was kind of a miracle that we got the right time.  Also, if we would have came just two months later we probably wouldn't have seen him because they just built a new church building and were moving there in August. 

Highland Park

June 13th:

The Metropolitan Museum of Art 

This was interesting....it had a real deer inside.  It looked cool but it's kind of disgusting too!

We also went and saw the Matilda Broadway show 1 1/2 times.  We went the first night we got into town but then left halfway through because of our family emergency when we were contemplating turning around and going home.  Luckily we were able to get discounted tickets another day and see the whole thing.  It was a really cute musical.  I'm glad that we were able to see it before they take it off Broadway at the end of this year.