Baby in the City.*

"It the diversity of choices and people, the raw urban beauty, the endless hum of possibility everywhere." - love the one you're with

Ahh, New York City.

Mike, Gabriel, and I made the trek to NYC this weekend to visit a friend from Mike’s days in Denver, and we had an absolutely wonderful time. We’d been to New York before, but only for super short day-long trips. We stayed in the Bronx for three nights, took the train into the city, and ate our little hearts out – both literally (YUM) and figuratively (so much to see!). We walked a billion miles, saw almost every corner of the city, and even got to catch up with an old friend or two.

Traveling with a baby? A breeze.

Sure, the trip was longer than we anticipated, but he impressed us with his awesome sitting-patiently-in-a-car-for-eleven-hours, willingness to bare his nether regions to the world while getting his diaper changed on many a park bench, and his laid-back, friendly ways that earned the attention of nearly everyone on the train, even a few tough looking girls who I totally didn’t expect to start cooing and waving from across the train to my little peanut.

Oh yeah, and I totally nursed him in three different parks (with a lightweight blanket over my shoulder so he didn’t suffocate). GO ME.

I learned three things from vacationing in NYC with a baby:

- To pack lightly - both for the trip and for our day trips into the city, we brought as little as possible. (Only having a diaper bag meant we weren't tempted to go shopping, either.)

- To change that diaper anywhere - it's not my fault there aren't public restrooms with changing tables!

- Acting like you know what you're doing makes people assume you do (i.e.: nursing in public, pretending you're interested in Pottery Barn just to use their nice, clean bathrooms, using the handicapped entrance to the subway for Gabe's stroller, etc.)

- (Okay, four) New Yorkers really freaking love babies. And are helpful. Stereotypes, be damned!
- (Okay, five!) Babies are going to lick subway windows. That's just going to happen. It might boost his immune system, right?

I am so glad I stepped, again, outside of my parenting comfort zone and went somewhere completely new, and a super big city, even!, with my little family.

While there, we basically walked all over the entire city and ate constantly. We are fairly casual vacationers, not so much into checking things of a list as we are just being somewhere. And eating as much as humanly possibly while being there, of course.

It's funny, because when my family traveled when I was a kid, we ate exactly two meals a day while traveling: the free breakfast buffet at the hotel we were staying at ("Eat a LOT. You won't eat again until dinner!!" my mother always warned) and once while out and about during the day. I'm sure this was to save money (five kids and all that - we were lucky to vacation, period.), but eating out while on vacation is our top priority: so many new places to try!

We ate falafel from a street cart in Central Park, frozen yogurt in the East Village with all the wealthy little middle school girls in the world, pizza from a hole-in-the-wall in the Bronx, eight different kinds of peanut butter at Peanut Butter & Co., ‘Shroom Burgers and fries at Shake Shack, challah French toast at an adorable Ukrainian diner, and knish and soft pretzels from the a street vendor. It was all delicious.

I also made about eleventy trillion Friends references. What can you do?

And, now, for photos!

A traveling we will go!

Central Park.

On le carroselat Bryant Park. He hated it, then loved it (giggles!), then was in a stupor.
(It should be noted that I looked for Tim Gunn while in New York. I did not find him.)

For lots more photos +

*Part Two of Sex in the City. Get it? Ha! I make myself giggle.
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Hey! Don't forget to enter my giveaway for $100 Babies R Us gift card on my review blog.

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Also! I have a guest post up on Drea's blog for Apartment Month; it's about apartment living with a baby.