This was the first time that we have visited my family in New York where Car Guy didn't have to go into Manhattan to work every day. He had one meeting and that was it! So we took the kids to do lots of stuff and made use of the reciprocity offered by our local museum membership. We went to the Long Island Children's Museum . . .
We also went to the Cold Spring Harbor Fish Hatchery. I brought Penguin Girl to this place once when she was about 3 years old. She fed the fish and we looked at the samples of wildlife in their aquarium. This time, the kids tried fishing. You'd think that at a fish hatchery there would be so many fish that they would be practically jumping out at you. You'd be wrong. We got set up with 2 fishing poles and some bait. The bait was a cup full of earthworms. Eeew. I told Car Guy in advance that if he wanted to let the kids try fishing, he would be baiting the hooks. I boycott the touching of creepy crawlies with my bare hands. Mr. Destructo got tired of the whole fishing things pretty quickly since nothing happened. That's when I took him to see the aquarium. We also hit the snack stash in the car. Snacks always make Mr. Destructo happy. Penguin Girl, however, was really determined to catch a fish. Did I mention it was a typical August day in New York? So, yeah, it was really hot standing around waiting for the fish to bite. Some people fishing seemed to have great luck. It was only after about 2 hours that we learned why that was. They were not using the icky worms as bait. They were using fancy bait, the kind you buy at a sporting goods store. They were little, squishy orange beads shaped to look like salmon roe. You put one of those on your hook and the fish come right away. Someone took pity on us and gave Penguin Girl a few. She landed a fish right away. Car Guy helped her reel it in. Finally! A fish! Now we can take off and enjoy the air conditioned splendor of the car!
We also went to the New York Hall of Science. Twice. Hey, it was free with our museum membership! Mr. Destructo and I played in the preschoolers area. He was really captivated by the kid-sized grocery store set up. He made good use of the conveyor belt that was part of the check out stand. Meanwhile, Penguin Girl roamed the museum with Car Guy.
Of course, a trip back home is not complete without the Peanut Gallery getting together. All of us including my parents and younger brother will go to have dim sum at least once during our visit. This time we also made regular visits to my older brother's house so that Penguin Girl could practice piano. The rule is that all the girls have to get their practicing done before they can run wild.
The visit flew by. Unfortunately, we could not stay longer. Penguin Girl had to get ready for school. Already! We had to get back home for her grade's Open House so we could haul in the massive load of supplies and meet her teacher. I hear she's got the stricter of the two teachers, which is good. Then I start my new part-time gig teaching a legal writing class at the local law school. Yikes!
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