what a trip!

Elsie and I got back from New England on Wednesday evening. We had such an amazing trip, and Elsie was an amazing baby. I can't believe how good she was the whole time and how much easier it was having her there than I thought it would be. She really did well on all the flights, which I am so grateful for. I was really nervous about that. (Thanks, Ang, for most of these pictures!)

We arrived in Connecticut on the 10th at night, so we were glad to get to Sarena's house and go to sleep. Elsie didn't sleep much on the plane, which made us both very tired. We shared a room with Angie, so she got to experience fun waking up at nights with Elsie. She was such a big help in holding her and bouncing her back to sleep.

On Thursday we drove up to Vermont and New Hampshire to see the fall foliage and some covered bridges. It was such a beautiful drive. We got to drive through several small towns with so much character...and a Dunkin' Donuts. Yes, that's right. Every town, big or small, has at least one Dunkin' Donuts. It is bizarre. That night while we were eating dinner, I realized that Elsie is really starting to become jealous when I'm eating and she isn't. Carson had the good idea of feeding her little bits of wonton noodle. She loved it!

Friday morning we picked up Jared from the airport and drove to Boston. It was a rainy day, so we decided to do the tour trolley around Boston instead of the freedom trail walking tour. We saw all of Boston...what a beautiful city. We got of the trolley at the Boston Tea Party site (which had a fire so it's under repair) to go to this children't museum for Carson. It ended up not being what we expected it to be, so we went back to wait for the trolley. Over an hour later, it came back by again. I guess most of the trolleys were skipping that stop because there's not much to see. Would've been nice to know! That night we ate at Legal's Seafood Restaurant. Angie and I split a lobster. It was the best lobster I had ever tasted. Oh, it was so good!

We decided to take it easy on Saturday. We took our time getting ready in the morning and relaxing, then we drove down to New Haven where the Yale campus is located. We walked around the campus a bit and looked at the amazing buildings, we ate at a little diner (where Elsie, again, insisted on eating with us), and went down to the waterfront. It was a nice, relaxing day by the ocean. When we got back home, Sarena had cooked a wonderful meal for us. It was so nice to eat a home-cooked meal. We got to visit for a while. It was fun to catch up with her. I went to bed pretty early that night. The lack of sleep was really starting to catch up with me.

Sunday morning we packed up our bags and headed to NYC! We got a little lost as we approached the city and then had a horrible time getting to our hotel in Brooklyn. One of the main roads we were supposed to take was blocked off, so we had to head to the busy streets of Manhattan to get to the Brooklyn Bridge. Angie did an amazing job of driving there. It is INSANE! People don't believe in staying in lanes, pedestrians don't believe in waiting for the walk signal, and everyone loves to use their horn! I don't know how she did it, but we eventually got to the hotel. Mitch met up with us there. I was so happy to see him. He looked so good...and so New York. He's got style! I was happy that he finally got to meet Elsie. She liked his glasses. She kept staring at him. After a quick subway ride and a bite to eat at a little deli, we went to the Natural History Museum. Wow, what a neat place. We could've spent the whole day there and still not seen everything. We took a quick jaunt over to Central Park to feed Elsie and see the view. That night we met up with Vanessa at a Chinese restaurant. It was a bit more authentic than I'm used to...the chicken head that came with the cooked chicken kind of ruined my appetite. The food really was good, though. We were so tired by the time we got back to the hotel because we got lost on the Subway and had to take a bus back to the hotel.