Leaving Floral Park, NY- June 2015

We are moving! Like right now. And it's the 9-year anniversary of when we met! I'm not going to talk about where we're moving (because internet) except to say farther east, closer to North Fork (about 45 minutes), and we're going to be a 10-minute drive from the beach! Since I won't talk about our new town, what I did last time we moved is talk about the place I'm leaving, in this case Floral Park.

First, you should know that there are two Floral Parks, one in Queens and one in Nassau County, Long Island. They border each other, but everything is completely different in the two towns- even the driving rules and definitely the taxes. We rented the upstairs of a two-family home in the more suburban Nassau County one.

Tulip Avenue in Floral Park

Floral Park is actually just a tiny village in the town of Hempstead. The village is so small that we routinely walked everywhere. We had a ten-minute walk to the LIRR (with a 30-minute ride into Penn Station or Atlantic Terminal). Some of our favorite places to walk were the Tiny Town playground and the main street, Tulip Avenue, with basically all the stores we needed. (Mani-pedis for $25 at Nail Garden. I will miss you!)

My favorite picture at Tiny Town, July 2015

When it was raining sometimes Kevin brought the kids to the library to hang out in the kids' room. The library also had concerts outside in the summer.

Huge Connect Four at FloPa Library

Our own little Alice in Wonderland

Concert at the Library, August 2014

Another reason we loved Tulip was the bars! Tulip Avenue has 4-5 Irish bars with bartenders straight from Ireland. We had a really fun St. Patrick's Day just five minutes from home one year with Michele and Jon. They also opened a speakeasy last year hidden behind a coffee shop with fancy drinks. It's so Manhattan/Brooklyn!

Bar Crawling on Tulip Avenue, St. Patrick's Day 2012

Every year our town had a festival in honor of the Belmont Stakes- the day after- and even though it wasn't very exciting, we took the kids three out of the five years we lived here.

Floral Park Street Fair, shortly after James was born, June 2011


Floral Park Street Fair, June 2014

We also went to the bird sanctuary a few times, though there seemed to be more flowers there than birds. I think the bird sanctuary was responsible for the whole town being more bird-full than normal.

Living in Floral Park, we were about 30 minutes from Jones Beach (though sometimes the traffic and crowding bummed me out a little). We went there about once or twice a year, sometimes in Spring or Fall just to let James run around in the sand. It nice having the beach just a short drive away, but I expect we're going be there even more now that we'll be 10 minutes from a nice family one.

Jones Beach, July 2013

So we will miss this little tiny village! We moved in here when we were newlyweds and both our kids were born here so we definitely have fond memories of the town, but we're finally ready to settle somewhere for a long while-- we think-- and we think we found the perfect place to do it. On to the next adventure!

Tulip Avenue at night

• Our Floral Park, NY Home 2010-2015
• Leaving Brooklyn 2008-2010
• Our Brooklyn Apartment 2008-2010

Grandma Visits- July 2015

Grandma came Friday afternoon and left just this morning, and the kids miss her so much they can't handle it. Friday was low-key and we went to the park and had some Thai takeout. Saturday we all went to the local Centennial Gardens & Bird Sanctuary, for some froyo at TCBY.

James and Grandma at the bird sanctuary on Saturday

Miranda's naughty face

Caught!

Smooches

Love.

Kevin with his two little monsters (see the claws?)

More love.

That's the cotton candy flavor again. J reports green poop.

Teething so much she passed up on froyo (All her molars came out at once!)

Peekaboo!

On Sunday Grandma took the kiddies to the park, and in the evening Kevin, Grandma and James went out for some German food, while I taught Miranda restaurant manner at home. Monday grandma babysat while Kevin and I ran some errands. I very nice visit but everyone is trying to schedule Grandma's return in August already.

Park on Sunday with Grandma

Fourth of July 2015

Happy belated Fourth of July! This post is low on words, high on pictures and patriotism.

Who loves America? We do! (James outfit by his dad)

The only kids at the park today!

He told her to get down because it says keep off!!

Selfie-time!

Climbing together.

Climbing together

Swinging together.

Wonder Woman training

Captain America training.

Miranda is 13 Months 2015

Miranda says: dada, tickle-tickle-tickle, mama, go, and yesh (yes) in that order of frequency. How exciting! She's been saying tickle-tickle for a long time now, but it really never gets old.

 

She also understands some simple things beyond the words she says, like when we tell her to get something (Get a book! Get the ball!), tell her to dance, or tell her no.

Sly smile

She constantly brings us books to read to her. Usually it's the same book over and over again for days and weeks at a time: Dinosaur Versus the Library, and Hello Ladybug are her two favorites.

Reading before bed.

She loves to dance and does so every day. She recently became interested in Country music. It's become our little thing.

Dancing!!

Rocking the Iowa outfits Dada got for them.

I am so cute!

She has 5 teeth, the four in the middle and a bonus one on top. She really got chubby lately so we think she's about to growth spurt again. She can drink from a bottle or sippy cup on her own but prefers that we feed her.

Hiding with a stolen sippy cup

She enjoys bath, but we think she might prefer showers because she insists on standing in the bath.

Bathtime is the best!

She still sleeps well, from 8 pm - 7:15 am or so, but sometimes gets up an hour earlier when James gets up. She takes two naps but fights the second one most of the time, and sometimes we have to give up.

  

Sleeping

She and James continue to be best friends.

I don't know what this game is

How did she get over the gate?

By problem-solving! James is her stool.

And guess who goes down the slide now! Like James, Miranda started walking early (9 months for James and 10 months for Miranda) and so they both had the experience of being the youngest toddlers at the park. Being able to run around the park doesn't mean being able to get any use out of it though, and for a long time she just ate wood chips while James played. But she climbs up now and goes down the slide mostly on her own. Nonetheless, I took a ride with her, mostly because I would look silly going down by myself.

Wednesday:

Weeee!


James comes to greet us.


On her own.

Thursday:

Trying to hang with the big boys

Saturday:

Siblings on the swings!

Yay!

Excuse me, can I have your ball? No? Okay then.

Nana Visits- September 2014

Nana did two nice things for us recently. She came and stayed with us on Saturday so that we could take James (without Miranda) to go apple-picking, and she even took an extra day from her stadium gig so that I wouldn't lose my mind while Kevin was at the Brooklyn Book Festival on Sunday. I wanted to save losing my mind for when he was on his midwest book tour. Ha!

Nana takes Miri for a stroll to the park

The woman who complains about how I dress Miri, put her in jammies.

 

Miri's first time in a swing!

Feeding Miranda applesauce... it gave her the poops.

Nana supporting the right team.

Reading with Bob

Nana and mini-Nana, chillin'.