HAPPY BIRTHDAY HANNAH!

Hannah loves all kinds of cake, but birthday cake is her favourite!

Big sister Caitlyn "helping" Hannah open gifts.


Our "Big" Little Girl

First day of school!

Since Mommy has been on maternity leave for the past year, she decided to spend the last week of it by herself- RELAXING!! Also, so we could start a routine happening before she actually starts work, Caitlyn & Hannah BOTH went to daycare this morning. Caitlyn has been going every Tuesday & Thursday for the past year, but for Hannah, this was her very first day of being with somebody other than a family member. As soon as we found Hannah's room at daycare she immediately ran to the toys (which are pretty much scattered around the entire room!). After introducing ourselves to her teacher, we said 'Bye'. Hannah simply looked up from her toys and waved while saying 'Bye-Bye!' She cried when Mommy & Daddy picked her up from her new toys to give her a hug. She didn't seem to mind one little bit when we left the room either. Mommy & Caitlyn already have a routine when they get to school. First they find Caitlyns cubby (shelf) and switch her outdoors shoes to her inside 'Crocs'. Then she gives hugs and goes to her room. Today, Caitlyn's class when on a field trip in a school bus to a local playground splash pad. Everybody apparantly had a great time.

Caitlyn & Hannah both had a great day and were very tired when Mommy & Daddy picked them up from daycare. Caitlyn had sand all over her feet, so Daddy gave them baths right away. Hannah, who must have been either very excited or very overwelmed (tired) by the whole daycare thing only napped for about 40 minutes during the day. She usually has 2-two hour naps!! Needless-to-say, Hannah fell aslepp and went to bed pretty early tonight. Caitlyn, on the other hand, thinks she'll miss something and decided that her bed time is too early (as usual) so she stayed up a little later. Wait until she learns that she's going to daycare 5 days in a row now, I think the 8 o'clock bedtime will be accepted very soon!

A Summer Wedding

Last weekend we drove to Orillia, Ontario (30 mins north of Barrie) for a beautiful outdoor summer wedding. It had just finished raining REALLY hard, but the sun was out in time for the bride to walk down the aisle.

Caitlyn's first dance with a boy (that her Daddy knows about anyways!) - its only a cousin though. Doesn't she look lovely in the new "practice" dress Grandma made for her? I'm not too sure what makes it a "practice dress" as it looks like a complete dress to me.
Hannah in her matching "practice" dress. Grandma is definitely VERY talented!
Hannah decides to check out the gold course! FORE!

New York, New York

Back in May of this year (when the family and I were in Winnipeg for Dad's surprise birthday party), Dad and I thought it would be a lot of fun if we took a trip to New York together to see the New York Yankees play in the original Yankee Stadium before it was demolished at the end of this season. I don't think either of us at the time actually thought that we'd follow through with that plan, but it sounded very exciting at the time. Well, needless to say, by looking at the following pictures, you will see that indeed Dad and I made the trip to New York to see the Yankees play baseball at ``the house that Ruth built``...

We drove to Detroit on Thursday night, got ourselves a 4:00 am wakeup call and made it to Detroit Metropolitan Airport for our 6:15 am flight to Chicago. In the air the pilot told us that the Chicago airport was shut down due to heavy rain, so we were being sent to Milwaukee, Wisconsin to refuel the plane. After about 30 minutes sitting on the runway, we were off to Chicago to catch our connecting flight to New York City. We ended up missing our originally scheduled flight (somehow it was able to take off in the ``heavy rain``), so we left on a later flight.

New York City from the airplane. Statue of Liberty is the small island on the top left. The current home of the New York Mets, Shea Stadium and its replacement Citi Field. Behind was the site of the 1964-1965 World Fair.


I booked us a sightseeing tour on a Grayline double-decker bus. This would be a must for anybody that has never been to New York City before or for somebody that doesn`t like traffic!
Times Square is a major intersection in Manhattan, New York City at the junction of Broadway and Seventh Avenue and stretching from West 42nd to West 47th Streets. The Times Square area consists of the blocks between Sixth and Eighth Avenues from east to west, and West 40th and West 53rd Streets from south to north, making up the western part of the commercial area of Midtown Manhattan.
Formerly Longacre Square, Times Square was renamed after the Times Building (now One Times Square), the former offices of The New York Times, in April 1904. Times Square has achieved the status of an iconic world landmark and has become a symbol of its city. Times Square is principally defined by its animated, digital advertisements.
The intersection of Broadway and 42nd Street, at the southeast corner of Times Square, is the Eastern Terminus of the Lincoln Highway, the first road across America.
The theaters of Broadway and the huge number of animated neon and LED signs have long made it one of New York's iconic images, and a symbol of the intensely urban aspects of Manhattan. Times Square is the only neighborhood with zoning ordinances requiring building owners to display illuminated signs. The density of illuminated signs in Times Square now rivals that of Las Vegas. Officially, signs in Times Square are called "spectaculars", and the largest of them are called "jumbotrons."
Madison Square Garden, often abbreviated as MSG, and known colloquially simply as The Garden, has been the name of four arenas in New York City. It is also the name of the entity which owns the arena and several of the professional sports franchises which play there. There have been four incarnations of the arena. The first two were located at the Northeast corner of Madison Square (Madison Ave. & 26th St.) from which the arena derived its name. Subsequently a new 17,000-seat Garden (opened December 15, 1925) was built at 50th Street and 8th Avenue, and the current Garden (opened February 14, 1968) is at 7th Avenue between 31st and 33rd Streets, situated on top of Pennsylvania Station.
US Post Office building

United Nations

Wall Street is a street in lower Manhattan, New York City, USA. It runs east from Broadway downhill to South Street on the East River, through the historical center of the Financial District. Wall Street was the first permanent home of the New York Stock Exchange; over time Wall Street became the name of the surrounding geographic neighborhood. Several major U.S. stock and other exchanges remain headquartered on Wall Street and in the Financial District, including the NYSE, NASDAQ, AMEX, NYMEX, and NYBOT.
Dad and I joked that we should have stopped here to get our outfits for Lee`s wedding. (We didn`t)

Central Park - The bus kept a tight schedule so we got to see lots of buildings and places, although because the bus kept moving, quite a few pictures didn`t turn out as nice as I would have liked.
No, we did not see `The Donald`- ``You`re fired!``

The Chrysler Building is an Art Deco skyscraper in New York City, located on the east side of Manhattan at the intersection of 42nd Street and Lexington Avenue. Standing at 319 metres (1,047 ft), it was briefly the world's tallest building before it was surpassed by the Empire State Building in 1931. However, the Chrysler Building remains the world's tallest brick building. After the destruction of the World Trade Center, it was again the second-tallest building in New York City until December 2007, when the spire was raised on the 365.8-metre (1,200 ft) Bank of America building, pushing the Chrysler Building into third position. In addition, the New York Times Building, which opened in 2007, is exactly tied with the Chrysler Building in height. View from the New York Marriott Marquis: The View Restaurant & Lounge. (Apparantly the only revolving restaurant in Times Square)



Times Square at dusk.

The Ed Sullivan Theater, which is located at 1697-1699 Broadway between West 53rd and West 54th Streets, in Manhattan, is a venerable radio and television studio in New York City. The 1200-seat theatre — of which 400 seats are currently used for TV audiences — has been used as a venue for live and taped CBS broadcasts since 1936.
It is best known as the longtime home of The Ed Sullivan Show, though since 1993, it has been the home for the Late Show with David Letterman. It is on the list of National Register of Historic Places.
Rupert Gee, owner of the Hello Deli is a neighbor of the Ed Sullivan Theatre and both are featured on David Letterman.




The Empire State Building is a 102-story Art Deco skyscraper in New York City at the intersection of Fifth Avenue and West 34th Street. Its name is derived from the nickname for the state of New York. It stood as the world's tallest building for more than forty years, from its completion in 1931 until construction of the World Trade Center's North Tower was completed in 1972. Following the destruction of the World Trade Center in 2001, the Empire State Building again became the tallest building in New York City and New York State.
The Empire State Building has been named by the American Society of Civil Engineers as one of the Seven Wonders of the Modern World. The building and its street floor interior are designated landmarks of the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission, and confirmed by the New York City Board of Estimate. It was designated as a National Historic Landmark in 1986. In 2007, it was ranked number one on the List of America's Favorite Architecture according to the AIA. The building is owned and managed by W&H Properties.[

Yankee Stadium is a ballpark in New York City that is the home of the New York Yankees, a Major League baseball team. Located at East 161st Street and River Avenue in The Bronx, it has hosted Yankees home games since 1923 and has a capacity of 57,545. It was formerly the home of the New York Giants football team, and once hosted dozens of boxing's most famous fights.
Yankee Stadium is one of the most famous sports venues in America, having hosted a variety of events and hundreds of historical moments in its existence. Its primary occupants, the Yankees, have won far more World Series championships than any other major league club. The stadium's nickname, "The House That Ruth Built", comes from the iconic Babe Ruth, the baseball superstar whose prime years coincided with the beginning of the Yankees' winning history.
In 2006, the Yankees began construction on a new $1.3 billion stadium in public parkland adjacent to Yankee Stadium. The Yankees are expecting to open their new home in 2009. Once the new stadium opens, most of the old stadium, including the above-ground structure, is to be demolished to become parkland.

Monument Park is a section of Yankee Stadium which contains the Yankees' retired numbers, a collection of monuments and plaques pertaining to the New York Yankees and other events to take place at the stadium and in the city.

Roger Eugene Maris (September 10, 1934 – December 14, 1985) was an American right fielder in Major League Baseball who is primarily remembered for breaking Babe Ruth's single-season home run record (60 home runs in the 1927 season), in 1961, a record that would stand for 37 years. In twelve Major League seasons, he played in seven World Series and won three championships.
Below the `metlife.com` sign is the number 20. This signifies the total number of remaining regular season home games to be played at Yankee Stadium.

A New York Subway line runs behind Yankee stadium. Those are restaurants, bars and sporting goods stores across the street.

New York Yankees 8, Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim 2
It was Oldtimers Day at Yankee Stadium. Some Yankee greats who were here for the festivities included: Yogi Berra, Reggie Jackson, David Wells, Rickey Henderson, Dave Winfield and David Cone.



Outside the stadium's main entrance gate, stands a 138-foot tall exhaust pipe in the shape of a baseball bat, complete with tape at the handle that frays off at the end. It is sponsored by Louisville Slugger, which leads to many people referring to it as "The Louisville Slugger", which is specifically designed to look like a Babe Ruth model. The bat is also often used as a designated meeting spot for fans to meet their ticket holding friends before entering the stadium.

Past New York Yankee Great, plus grafiti.
Dad and I wondered why there was a green flag with a maple leaf and a circle around it at Yankee Stadium. Thanks to the wonders of Google and Wikipedia, I have learned that this is the flag of the New York City Department of Parks & Recreation.
New Yankee Stadium is the new ballpark for the New York Yankees, currently under construction. The new ballpark will retain the Yankee Stadium title held by the current stadium. It is being built on the current site of Macombs Dam Park in the New York City borough of the Bronx, across the street from the current Yankee Stadium, which it will replace. The existing stadium opened in 1923 and the New Yankee Stadium is set to open in 2009.
Groundbreaking ceremonies for the stadium took place on August 16, 2006, the 58th anniversary of Babe Ruth's death, with team owner George Steinbrenner, then-Governor of New York George Pataki, and Mayor of New York City Michael Bloomberg among the notables donning Yankees hard hats and wielding ceremonial shovels to mark the occasion. The new facility has a planned 2009 opening, coinciding with the opening of Citi Field, future home of the New York Mets. At a total cost of $1.3 billion (US), it is roughly 500 times the cost of the original Stadium in 1923, and the most expensive stadium ever built in the United States as well as the third most expensive stadium ever built in the world after Wembley Stadium in London, and the Stade Olympique in Montreal.
What an amazing experience I had with my Dad in New York City!! Hopefully, Dad and I can go on more trips like this in the future. Maybe we can make a trip every two years, or so.

DAD - THANKS FOR A GREAT & EXCITING TRIP!!

On our return flight from New York to Chicago, it was so clear that I was able to take this aerial shot of the city we live in. (Our house is almost in the centre)

Thanks also to Google.com, Wikipedia.com & the invention of cut & paste for allowing me to provide additional information to include with this posting.