A Visit to the "BIG APPLE"

Shawn and I had a great get-a-way to New York City the week we got back from Utah to be with Kate and Chad for his graduation. I had some meetings to attend and Shawh was more than happy to go with me. We had been to NYC before, but this time we just wanted to spend some time together and see some of the tourist sights the city has to offer. Let me tell you, it was a GREAT trip.

We stayed in a very nice hotel (thanks to our company) called The London. Our room was a suite and large by New York standards. Gordon Ramsey has his New York restaurant in the hotel; we sampled his food through room service one night and it was delicious! Hell's Kitchen it wasn't.
We took the subway and caught the fairy to the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island.

We took in a Broadway play - Mary Poppins and it was really good. We would recommend it to everyone if it comes your way. Your kids will like it too.

We attended the broadcast of Live with Regis and Kelly. Their guests were Jeff Propst (host of the Survivor) and Carly Simon (singer, song writer). Reeeeg and Kelly were relaxed and mingled with the audience comfortably during the commercial breaks. There were only about 120-150 people in the audience and we all learned the proper way to be a quiet, clapping, fast clapping, excited audience. I felt a little like a circus animal having to perform in a certain way (whether you wanted to or not).

The show lasted and hour and we were off to the temple.

Did I mention that we sampled some of the food Manhattan has to offer? Well, we didn't pig out, but it was nice to have many choices no matter what time of day or night you were out. One of Shawn's favorites is Carnegie Deli, which she liked from being in NYC with her sister, Diana and her mother last year.

I loved how the sandwiches were piled high with meat and they were really good.

Not this good, but almost this good!!!

During our few days there, we traveled to a number of the different sections of Manhattan - Little Italy, Chinatown, SOHO, the Garment District, etc. There were people everywhere.......at all times of the day and night. I love the energy of the City.

For those bargain hunters out there, Our lease favorite experience was walking on Canal Street among all the rip off vendors selling fake and stolen merchandise. Overall, the weather was good and we had enough down time to not make it too rushed. Our trip ended by going to Church with the Manhattan 2nd Ward, grabbed a bite of lunch and headed to the airport.

As I said before, it was a great trip!!!!!

Chad's Graduation

Shawn and I traveled to Utah to be with Kate and Chad for his graduation from BYU. He graduated Magna Cum Laude in Exercise Science and is planning to attend THE Ohio State University to attend Dental School starting this fall.

We had a great time with Kate, Chad and all of Chad's family, who turned out en masse to show their pride for the first of the children to graduate from college. We are proud of you Chad!!!

We had a nice dinner in The Tree Room at Sundance on the night we arrived.

Shawn had a bad cold hit her hard once we arrived and she spent the rest of the trip, except for Chad's actual graduation, in bed in our hotel room. I, on the other hand, spent a lot of time with the Lyon's. At the end of the week we took a couple of days to get Kate and Chad's apartment all packed up and ready to be loaded into a U-Haul truck for their move to Ohio. They loaded their U-haul truck on Saturday and we left on Sunday to return home.

We brought their cat Harley with us on the plane. They got some medicine for Harley to take so he would be calm, but he seemed to actually get quite excited and tried his best to rip out of the carrier Kate had for us to transport him. At one point one of the flight attendants asked if I was traveling with an attended pet animal. I said yes and she said I needed to keep a closer eye on him, because he was in the plane back several rows. We were surprised and I went back and got him from another passenger who was holding Harley. I put him back in the carrier and put a twisty tie on the two zippers to hold them together so he couldn’t escape again.