A Date to Remember

Although today, we, like most people, are remembering the awful events of Sept. 11th, 2001, we also have reason to celebrate. Today, Lexi crawled for the first time. We are very excited that she finally has figured out how to coordinate her arms and legs and harness enough strength to make it all work. Seems kind of fitting that it occurred today, when we are reminded of just how fragile life can be, and how we must celebrate the triumphs in life as well. Our little girl has been fighting to overcome many obstacles since the day she was born, and this feat is huge in proving once again what an amazing little fighter she is. So, today we have been given a great way to celebrate on an otherwise somber day.

Today Show Debut

Every morning, Lexi and I watch the first half hour of the Today Show in order to stay up-to-date on the news. Today, we actually got to see it live and meet some of the Today Show personalities. Well, it was really Lexi who got to meet all of them, as they were all entranced with her. She absolutely loved Al Roker, who talked about her big belly.

We got to NBC studios a little before 5am, which was over-shooting things a bit, but Lexi handled it well. We did get to be the first in line with the pick of our spot to stand when visitors were allowed to enter the plaza, so we chose to stand right next to Lennie, a Today Show regular.

Before the show even started, they came out and picked a lady behind us to be given a make over. As they filmed the approach to this lady, the celebrity make-up artists gushed over Lexi and said how cute she was. Then, they taped the lady getting selected, and the two celebrities on camera commented on how cute Lexi was and that they should make her over. No guarantees, but we're hoping that airs during Friday's Today Show, as it should give Lexi some good air time.

We stayed for a little over 2 hours of the taping. They didn't do much on the plaza this morning, but we did make our TV debut during the opening of the second hour of the show, as we were standing right behind Matt Lauer, Meredith Viera, and Al Roker. Then, Meredith and Al came over and talked to us off camera, which was fun. We were amazed at how much they made the rounds interacting with people and greeting them. Through the window, we also got to check out celebrities like Brooks and Dunn, Tyra Banks, and embattled Illinois governor Rod Blagojevich, who we thought could have used the make-over more so than the ones from the crowd. It was a great experience, and the highlight of my New York trip for sure!

Lexi meets the Bronx Bombers

Today, Lexi made it to her 4th major league ballpark in her first full summer of life. Not many one-year-olds can say that, but if Brian is going to be her dad, and we are going to be her parents, she might as well get used to traveling a lot and hitting major league ballgames early in life. So, we completed our last full day in New York by going to a Yankees game in the Bronx. We were in the sun, and although it was only in the high 70's, it was still pretty hot, so I perfected the pathetic mother look once again and soon got escorted to some great seats in the shade. Brian got to join us after a few innings, and I realized that traveling with a baby can actually have some major perks! We all got to enjoy the pageantry of a game at Yankee Stadium on a holiday, and Brian got to see Mariano Rivera trot onto the field in the 9th to Metallica's Enter Sandman and close the deal, so all was a success.

After the game we took the subway back to the hotel to give an exhausted Alexis a little down time. Then we met some good friends from high school for dinner at the Shake Shack in Madison Square Park, which is just a few blocks away from the hotel we are staying at. We had a great time catching up with them, and we enjoyed the shack burgers and shakes at this famous New York landmark.

Double Shots of the Crown

Sunday was time for Lexi to check out the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island. We took a quick cab to the waterfront and then took a ferry between the islands in the harbor, first stopping at Liberty Island and then continuing on to Ellis Island. Lexi was all smiles on the ferry, so she obviously enjoyed the boat rocking and rolling and people watching quite a bit.

On Liberty Island we saw the Statue of Liberty and were fortunate to plan ahead and get tickets to go all the way up in the newly opened crown. However, no children Lexi's age are allowed up the narrow, winding staircase to get to the very top of the crown, so Laura and I had to go up separately, with the other entertaining Lexi in the museum at the bottom. It was a picture perfect day in New York, so the views from the crown were spectacular. Since we had to go up separately, we seemed to take duplicate shots of everything and ended up with double shots of the crown, but that's better than the alternative.

We spent a little time in the museum, reading up on the history and checking out the original torch, and then spent quite a bit of time time walking around the island. It was fairly crowded, but the crown tickets acted like a VIP pass to eliminate most of the long lines, so we got to see the highlights in a relatively short amount of time.

More than anything, it was great just hanging out on the island with three of my favorite ladies: Laura, Lexi, and Lady Liberty. After the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island, we took the ferry back to New York. We walked up Broadway to check out Ground Zero, Wall Street, and the financial district. Inexplicably, Lexi pretty much snoozed through our trip down Wall St. How she could sleep through the excitement of seeing the NY Stock Exchange and the center of the world's financial markets is beyond me, but that's indeed what happened.

Finally, we finished the day by walking across the Brooklyn Bridge and eating some NY style pizza. Not quite sure if the pizza was good enough to justify the two-hours of standing in line with Lexi. However, the experience of walking across the Brooklyn Bridge in the day light, getting the experience of eating at Grimaldi's, and then walking back across the bridge at night, made for a great evening.