Dance

Dance dominated this week. Last Sunday we had a parent's meeting at 2:00 followed by a dress rehearsal. It took over four hours to get it all done. Then on Wednesday there was another brief meeting for those who didn't listen on Sunday (don't you love that?) and another dress rehearsal at 4:00. We were there until 8:00.

Last night the recital started at 6:30. There was one ten minute intermission. We finished at 9:40. That was a long recital!! But it's all age groups, all the classes, plus the four companies--petite, mini, junior and senior.

Hip Hop

Hip Hop to Ice Cream Paint Job

Jazz to Black and Gold

Finale

Finale

Eight Year Trophy--She has done jazz all eight  years I think, tap for one or two years, hip hop for two years and ballet for one or two years when she was little. She is not into ballet at all.

The eight year group

Adam came to both dress rehearsals and brought her flowers.

Before the recital

Outside the civic center before the recital

The other girl's mom took these on her phone.

 After the recital we went to Applebees. It was after 10 p.m. Jessica was our server. We went all out because it was for both the concert, which I missed, and the recital.

Here are some pictures from while I was in NYC.

Jasmine's spring concert

The twins' actual birthday.

Dressed for Jasmine's concert which was on their birthday. They got pizza afterwards.

They ran the Armed Forces Day run the 17th. We were trying to get a flight home.

The next day was Haitian Flag day, and we were home for that.

They made cheesecake with blueberries on top.

Monday night was the band banquet for advanced band.

So that's how our week went.

New York 5

I don't think I said last post, but Aladdin was amazing. The Genie stole the show. So talented and funny. The music was great and so were the costumes. It is a show not to be missed. Hard to describe the combination of talent, colorful costumes, sets and the music. If you get a chance, go see it. I hope the take it on the road in a few years.

After the show we bought souvenirs on the street and went to Applebees. Jessica wanted to be able to say she went to an Applebees in NY. (She works in one here). Unfortunately, it was much more expensive, and the service wasn't all that great.

Watching Jessica's picture of NYC being made after Applebees.

All done with spray paint, can lid and putty knife.

Souvenirs for the youngest three.

In the Subway.

It was interesting to talk to the musicians. Yeah, we did talk to them. They are people too. Plus Jessica plays sax and I did in another life. We also always dropped money in the cases if we took their picture.

Wednesday morning we planned to go to the Statue of Liberty again. Remember we'd changed plans Tuesday and ended up not going. We stopped at McDonalds for fries. They have Smart Phone chargers built into the table. I don't normally carry a phone. I only have a tracfone I buy minutes for.

This time we made it!

Me reading a book to Jessica. We read chapters at a few different places--here, Central Park, on the subway etc.

Later in the day we went to Rockefeller plaza. We went to Top of the Rock, but there was zero visibility. We exchanged our tickets for ones for tomorrow night instead.

We went to the M & M store and the Hershey store. We went to Nintendo World, but unlike the other stores in the area, it was already closed.

On Thursday we went to Madam Tussauds. We've been to the one in London, Rick and I twice, Tyler and Jessica once. 

Generic wax figure.

We wanted to go to John's Pizza but needed directions.

It's in what used to be a church.

After that we decided to go to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The subway was having a lot of problems, and we ended up walking. We got there about 3:30 and finally got our headsets for the guided tour at 4:00. What we hadn't realized was that the museum closed at 5:30. We only got to do the first part of the tour! We needed at least five hours there. If we'd known it closed that early, we would have planned to do it all day Friday because we'd left Friday open.  That was really disappointing.

We went back to Top of the Rock and it was zero visibility again. They offered us tickets for Friday, but then admitted that Friday was going to be zero visibility again. We were flying out Saturday, so we asked them for our City Pass ticket back because there was another half to it for another museum. They said they couldn't do that, and they couldn't refund our money. So we were just out the $25 each. We argued for quite a while. Then we finally changed the tickets for Saturday and went down to the ticket line and gave them to a guy who hadn't yet bought tickets. I hope he was able to use them so they at least weren't wasted.

On Friday we went to see Trinity Church from the movie National Treasure.

Trinity Church

We went to a candy store that had a lot of candy we'd bought in England years back and a lot of candy that I haven't seen since I was a kid, we had a snack at Chinatown, and then went back to the hotel to organize for our flight home the next day. Then we went to Grand Central Station.

Grand Central Station

We ate at the hot dog place.

Then we jumped on the subway and went to buy last minute souvenirs.

We got up early Saturday and caught the subway to New York Penn. We took a train to Newark Penn. We caught the bus to Newark airport. All to find out that we'd been bumped from the flight because of a connection problem. The computer dumped us off the flight instead of changing our connecting flight to a later one. So after over an hour of trying to work things out, we were sent by taxi to Laguardia. Instead of arriving home at noon, we got in at 8:00 p.m. But we had good flights and it all worked out okay.

The runway was a bridge.


So that was our trip. We've known for four years this trip was coming and now it's over. That's a strange feeling.
We are back into routine. Jasmine has dance recital tomorrow, and Kayla has a big field trip to some caverns. Kaleb still has field day ahead. We are done June 7. Lots to do between now and then, but it's winding down. What's left for you this school year? 

New York 4

Between going to the 9/11 Memorial and St Paul's on Tuesday, we decided to go into Burger King for a quick lunch. It's so different there. When we walked in, I headed straight to the counters to order. They said that was for carry out only. Eat-in was upstairs. They seated us with a Burger King menu, took our order and delivered our bag of food to our table on a tray. Then they brought mayo and ketchup packets on a tray! I have never tipped at a Burger King before!

I guess they have this sign in case you don't recognize the boy/girl  pictures?

There was a woman's restroom and one for both. This guy was waiting when I went in the womens' and was still there with three guys behind him when I came out. So, was it a man or woman in there holding things up?

What's the weirdest fast food experience you've had?

We loved seeing the art work, musicians and other people in the subway. We never took a  picture without 
dropping money in the instrument case.

 We went to the Museum of Modern art. We only went because we had tickets in the city pass book. 
We were not impressed and didn't stay long. Hard to believe the above and below pictures contain "art." 
I grew up with a garage full of old chairs, bike tires and shovels and
I didn't consider it art.

To me, broken dishes belong in the trash. But I guess it is

in the eye of the beholder.

My brother got a $1,000 Tiffany's gift card and nothing to do with it, so he sent it to me and we took it to NYC with us to the flagship store. Most of it went to a necklace for Jessica. 

 We stopped at FAO Schwarz toy store.
Then we went back to the hotel to get ready for Aladdin at Amsterdam Theater.

There's more from Tuesday, but I've messed something up and everything keeps going off center, so I'm going to end this post for now.