Big Fish

William's Cub Scout pack had a family fishing event on Sunday afternoon.  I was traveling but John took his fishing loving son, and this is what he caught!  It was the longest fish caught that day.   Love the catfish whiskers!   He told his den leader that it was really special for him to catch a catfish because that was the very first fish he ever caught.  That picture is below.  So sweet!

 

Backyard Fun & Baseball

For William's 3rd birthday, John built him an amazing sandbox that sits on our patio.  It is nestled perfectly under a tree for shady play.  The only problem is that tree's delicate petals and berries - and our neighbor's maple tree - and every other berry and leaf in a 50 mile radius seemed to land in the sandbox and it fell to me to clean it.  This year, my suggestion for a cover was executed on as a father-son building project!  I was nice enough to clean out the old sand, but wasn't very clever in my execution.  Who knew a 50 gallon trash can full of sand couldn't be moved?!  John ended up bagging the sand over the course of several weeks to get rid of it.  Oops!

 Bonus picture:  working from home one day I caught this guy watching me.    Looking out later, there were two cardinals on a branch in the big tree by the street.

We have two new dogs as neighbors - one on each side.   When we moved in with Rachel, she joined 3 other dogs in our trio of houses.  Each of the 4 dogs was about the same age, so they all passed within quick succession of each other.   The other two families both got puppies this summer!  One side is a labradoodle boy named Zeus, who is a big ball of fluff, and occasionally energy but usually just fluff!  The other side is a yellow lab girl named Rosie.  She has so much energy, and she and the boy are a good match for running around in the back yard!   I hope William gets a chance to dog sit over the years. 

 

Baseball season starts and ends early here, but it is so much fun to watch William and his friends play.  The big highlight this year was that he got to pitch an inning in a game, and he did a great job!   I was hoping he would try it, but I had no idea that he was going to do it.   I was thankful that I had rearranged my work travel that day in order to go to his game and fly out later since I knew I was going to miss his second game of the week.   John was sure to tell William after the fact that I had done that.  Turns out John had known he could pitch at one of the two games and when he found out which one I would be at, he had him pitch that one! 

 

The boy he is pitching to here on the opposing team is actually his best buddy from day care, Liam. 

For the boys' last game of the year they got to play under the lights at a different field than we usually have.  It was all smiles after the game, but he did take a baseball to the face when it foul tipped off his bat.   Luckily he was fine and was flossing on 2nd base soon enough, but mom, dad and coaches were all nervous at first.

NYC - Sunday in the City

We got to enjoy one more meal with the grooms before we headed home on Sunday evening.   Ryan and Tarek (and Ernie and Harboor) hosted friends and family at their home for a sunny afternoon brunch on the condo rooftop.  We enjoyed delicious Mediterranean foods and treats and more refreshing beverages.  The views and the company were fantastic!   Looks like I forgot to take pictures of most of it!

 

I tried getting a picture from the plane of the Intrepid but I can't see it.  I'll have to pull up a map to see whether I'm too far south, because I was expecting it to be on the left side about 1/3 of the way up.

NYC - Saturday in the City (VanKati Wedding Day!)

This is a post with a lot of pictures!  I couldn't edit myself because everyone looks so lovely dressed up in their finery for the festivities!   The wedding was held on the terrace at The Redbury Hotel with the reception in the banquet rooms.  There were around 100 guest in attendance, though only two were under the age of 21, so they had the run of the place!

William looked so sharp in his first suit! Happily we found one in blue, which is the color of Ryan's tux.  I say happily, because Nordstrom only had one suit in stock in size 8 so that's what he got!

My parents will celebrate their 45th wedding anniversary this November.   Ryan picked out my dad's tie to match the disco ball decorations sprinkled throughout the venue.

 These two pictures are probably my favorite of the entire weekend.

 

We did family photos before the wedding (and the guys had photos before they got to the hotel, as well, including an infamous Tarek "jump" photo that resulted in an emergency run to Bloomingdales for new tuxedo pants!).   After photos were done and chairs rearranged, the grooms disappeared and the guests arrived.   We mingled a bit more before finding our places for the ceremony.

The ceremony was beautiful and then we ate and drank and danced and ate and drank and danced.  It was fun to catch up with Ryan's friends whom I have met over the years as well as meet new ones.  They had several guests who had traveled from overseas.  Ryan's friend, Sabine, from Germany, whom John and I had first met 20 years ago in Bonn, brought William and Elias gift bags full of Kinder Surprise Eggs. Those two filled up on candy and sodas and had a pretty festive evening!

NYC - Friday in the City

Friday was our being tourists day.   John, William, my dad and I started the morning at the USS Intrepid Museum.  As we neared the Hudson it was cool to see a cruise ship coming into port!  Since we are members of the Field Museum in Chicago, we had reciprocal privileges at the Intrepid and got free admission! 

 



First up was the submarine tour before the line got too long.  The docent gave us some great information about how the periscopes work and operating the sub.  He seemed genuinely thrilled to hear our questions and explain sub life to us.   Touring submarines always reminds me why I have a desk job!  I'm way too claustrophobic and sunlight loving to be a submariner!

Next we went up to the flight deck and used our audio guides to learn about the various aircraft parked up top.   We also learned how the Intrepid was used as a command center after 9/11.   Docked next to the Intrepid was a cruise ship called the Peace Boat, an international vessel traveling the world.  Being up on deck with cruise ships, a war ship, and a major city with skyscrapers looming was such a strange contrast of sights.   I guess that sums up NYC though....

At the end of the deck is the hanger for the Space Shuttle Discovery.  This was the second space shuttle that John and I were going to see, as we also saw one during our time in Washington, D.C. at the Udvar-Hazy Air & Space Museum at Dulles.  I had been thinking it was Enterprise or Endeavor that we saw, but just remembered it was one that had never been in space.  As we read more about Discovery, I thought its story sounded so familiar to the one I already saw.   And sure enough.  It WAS the same one we already saw!

When it came time to retire the space shuttle fleet, there were four of the six remaining (since Challenger and Columbia were destroyed).   Kennedy Space Center, The Smithsonian, California Science Center and the Intrepid Museum were selected as the homes for the four.  But, since Smithsonian clearly "out ranks" the Intrepid Museum, they swapped out the training shuttle on display at the Smithsonian and shipped it up to NYC and installed the Enterprise in DC. 

It was really fascinating.  I wish we had planned more time at the Intrepid to see more of the WWII exhibits on the decks of the boat.  But we spent so much time exploring the submarine, the flight deck and the space shuttle pavilion that we were starving and needed to wrap up our visit.  But not before William got to do a flight simulator.  He had his eye on it from early on in the day and convinced John to go with him.  My dad and I really enjoyed watching that big box turn this way and that, and seeing them on the screen trying to "fly" their plane!

We started to walk back to the hotel but found a little sports bar for lunch first.   No Roger VanMeter vacation is complete without a Guinness-like beer for lunch!  

Our evening plans included an early bird dinner around the corner from The Redbury at a random place I found on Open Table.   The specialty was an appetizer of bacon with jalapeno jam.  And it was....fine.  We had to try it though!   Our steaks were good, and we were quickly on our way to the show:  The Lion King on Broadway!

The show was fantastic!  I knew that we needed to have aisle seats so we sat 3 and 2 instead of 5 wide to get two aisle seats.   For me it was really fun to have my parents gawk at Times Square!   It was less amazing trying to get an Uber back to the hotel in Times Square after dark, but it wasn't too bad considering!