Fletcher of the Day: Happy new year!

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Fletcher and I made cupcakes for the party at the petting zoo tonight

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20 years ago today, I arrived in Amsterdam for the first time to visit Darina, and met the love of my life, @Dutchcowboy. Happy Meetaversary!

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Fletcher of the Day: Ellie!

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Carrot cake is finished and ready for tonight!

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Fletcher of the Day: Egg

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Fletcher of the Day: Firefighters like croissants

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FaceTime with my brother- he's 2 blocks from home...

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Fletcher of the Day: Boys night

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Dinner with the girls

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Fletcher of the Day: Hide and seek

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Lookie what @Dutchcowboy made!

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Fletcher's firehouse

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Fletcher of the Day: Christmas Presents

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Ready for the main event tomorrow!

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Milk and cookies for Santa Claus

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Fletcher of the Day: Naptime

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Fletcher of the Day: Papa is home

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Fletcher of the day: Fireman ready

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Fletcher of the day: Christmas party at crèche

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Fletcher of the day: Assistant cookie baker

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Fletcher of the day: Train

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Fletcher of the day: Batman eating a cupcake

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Fletcher of the day: Neighbors

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Fletcher of the day: IPad

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Fletcher of the day: Sarah

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Fletcher of the day: Fire hat

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Fletcher of the day: Going for a ride

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Fletcher of the day: Christmas tree

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Fletcher of the day: sous chef

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Back in the harbor

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Clear winter day on the love boat

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Me with the bride!

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It's official! Yme and Nicole are married!

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Fletcher of the day: looking at the snow

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Fletcher of the day: Silly boy

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Hanging out with my pretty girl

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Fletcher of the day: The tired traveller

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Dispatches From New York Week 9: Until we meet again!

As we are fast approaching our departure date (tomorrow!) we've spent another full, busy week in New York. 

Monday was a bit of a hectic day, because I decided I wanted to 'do-over' Thanksgiving and make my own dinner. Thanks to the easy availability of Turkey dinner items here in the US, it was easy to gather and easy to cook...just took some time to gather! I finished cooking the dinner in under 2 hours (in Amsterdam it usually takes me the better part of a day, plus prep work). Fletcher helped me with the mashed potatoes and the stuffing, which was fun for both of us- and made the meal all the more sweeter. Our family Thanksgiving.

On Tuesday it rained all day, so we kind of hung around the house until my sister, Connie, and her husband, Tim arrived.  They landed in the afternoon so Fletcher and I headed over to their (4 blocks away) hotel and took a cab to midtown for dinner and a visit to Times Square. For your first night in New York- hit the big sights for a big impression!

Connie and Tim inTimes Square

We walked around a bit, then headed back to our apartment for a visit before calling it a night

On Wednesday we went to the Wee Arts session where Fletcher, as per usual, painted, played with clay and sang

painting with cars

Fletcher in action during the music session

After class we went back to the apartment and Fletcher took a nap (after some convincing...) that lasted 2 hours. 2 hours! He doesn't nap much, so anytime he does is a victory. yay!

Wednesday night we met up with Tim and Connie and went to a Japanese American Pub called Zutto in TriBeCa. The food was excellent, but the service was fantastic. Fletcher accidentally dropped a fireman in between the wall and the sealed booth seat we were sitting on. They practically tore the booth apart to get it for us. Very nice.

We walked back to our apartment in SoHo and Tim and Connie took advantage of the clear weather and decided to head up to midtown to the Empire State Building, which they really enjoyed.

On Thursday we went to midtown to visit Rockefeller Center, The New York Public Library, Bryant Park and Grand Central Station.

At Rockefeller Center, we checked out the Christmas Tree, and took a photo with a fireman

Checking out the tree

One of the famous lion's at the NY Public Library

The Library Building

Behind the Public Library is Bryant Park, which has a beautiful old carousel from France. Fletcher was asleep, so we'll have to go back- to the carousel and to the Children's Center at the Public Library.

Bunny!

After walking past the library we headed to Grand Central Station where we had lunch at Juniors.

We headed back to SoHo while Connie and Tim checked out the area a bit more before meeting up with Tim's cousin in the East Village for dinner.

Friday was Tim's 50th birthday and we started out by going to the Upper West Side to visit the American Museum of Natural History and the 'Biiiig Dinosaurssss' (as Fletcher calls them).

Playing with Auntie Connie in the Subway

The museum is quite impressive. You walk into the Teddy Roosevelt Rotunda and are immediately greeted with a Barosaurus skeleton (which is large and impressive!). Fletcher was quite impressed.

We wandered around the museum (which is very large!) and visited various exhibits. The Dinosaurs and the Hall of Ocean Life were Fletcher's favorites. He loved looking at the large animals. Several exhibits had bronze sculptures of various animal parts- Duck feet, dolphin vertabrae etc, so you can feel what they are like. The interactive element is always a big hit with the under 3 set.

Hello there friend, can you tell me where the T-rex is?

Fletcher started to get restless after a while and we were hungry so we headed off to search for food

Firefighter Fletcher with Birthday Boy Tim and Auntie Connie

before heading back downtown to rest up for the evenings festivities. On our way to the subway, we ran into Honest Abe

Honest Abe

Friday night we celebrated Tim's Birthday by having dinner at Lupa's Osteria Romana. A fantastic Italian Restaurant a few blocks from our apartment. We had a slight hitch in the plans when our babysitter cancelled at the last minute, but Uncle Riley stepped in to babysit so we were able to enjoy a lovely dinner with a few drinks afterwards. Celebrating Tim's Birthday in Style.

Sisters!

Saturday was a 'recovery' day from Friday night. Maarten and Tim enjoyed themselves, a lot, on Friday. After a late start we headed to midtown and ended up at Madison Square Park, so Connie and Time could see Eataly, then we could grab a burger at the lovely Shake Shack. Lekker!

Final visit for this trip!

We wandered up to 34th street since Connie wanted to see Macy's Christmas window displays, but it was too crowded, so Fletcher and I headed back to SoHo for an early night with Maarten, who spent the day 'In recovery' :)

On Sunday we met Connie and Tim downstairs for brunch at Le Pescadeux, a restaurant on the ground floor of our apartment building. Convenient to just walk downstairs! Fletcher was showing signs of being sicky, so after a yummy brunch, we went back upstairs while Connie and Tim went off to walk the Highline. Fletcher developed a fever and we spent most of the afternoon eating popsicles and watching tv while Maarten packed our 12,000 suitcases. He rallied a bit in the evening, so we met up with Tim and Connie and headed to Joe's Shanghai for some dumplings (Fletcher had 3)

Soup dumplings

It's Monday morning now. It's a sunny day (finally!) and Fletcher and I are sitting on the couch after a long, feverish night. He seems to be coughing now, so I imagine we will be spending our last day in New York hanging out here.

We are all excited to be going back to Amsterdam tonight (we have a 11pm flight). We have missed our cats, Freddy and Pebbels a lot. We also missed our home- our neighbors, and friends and family. New York has been the beginning of a grand adventure, one which I feel has only just begun. We aren't through with New York. Or Amsterdam.  We'll be back in a few months :0).