Give me your tired, your poor......

Thursday night we drove down to Long Island for the big Belmont Stakes weekend. Early the next morning. we caught the 7:44 am train into the city to see the Statue of Liberty with mom, dad, Kris, Ryan, Aidan & Brian. We were worried about the kids after getting in pretty late the night before, but, thankfully, the kids were GREAT. Joey really seemed to enjoy his 1st train ride pointing out the other trains to us - "mo trains, momma.... mo trains, mamaw...." we heard that phrase over and over :)

The morning was very overcast so I was a little disappointed because the pictures weren't as great as I had hoped - I was really hoping for a beautiful blue sky background. It was still amazing.

We walked around the grounds and took a bunch of pictures:

Here's a picture of all us (except my sis Kristen - she took the picture) - we took it right after getting off the boat and unfortunately the statue is facing the opposite direction:






Here are the kids and me in front of the statue





After walking around for a bit, we headed in to the museum and pedestal observation deck (it's the highest level you can get to since 9/11). There was a ton of security - two different checkpoints actually and, unfortunately, for the one to get into the museum and observation deck there was this air blowing part that just freaked Alli out and she wanted no part of it. So, Paul took her out and just walked around the grounds with her - they actually spotted us and waved when we were outside.

The museum had life size replicas of the torch and Lady Liberty's face and foot. Here are some pictures with my little model Emily:

Then we climbed 156 stairs - boy that was a little tougher than I thought - especially having to carry an extra 30lbs (Joey). Thankfully for me though, mom and Brian offered to take turns carrying him. We were all huffing and puffing by the time we got to the top. At the top, we could look all the way up into the statue - it was really cool.

Walking outside, we could see the Manhattan skyline and the grounds. Looking up was cool, but it didn't give you the best angle to see.

After we got back down, we found out my brother in law Ryan was going to be interviewed by FOX news about what it meant to him to be an American and what freedom meant to him. Unfortunately since we don't live down here, we won't be able to see if he actually makes it on tv, but they said it would be on their website after July 1st.

After his interview was done, we headed back on the ferry. Joey conked out in his stroller which was good since he was missing his usual nap.




Since we missed tne train back by just a couple of minutes (and had an hour to wait for the next one) Paul and the kids and I walked down to Times Square and went into the enormous Toys R Us there.



To end the day, Paul, my dad, Brian & Ryan headed to a Yankees game. Paul was looking forward to this all day - he's a huge Yankees fan. It was too bad they lost, but they still had a great time.