In early May, I went back to New York (shocking two visits in a couple of weeks!) for a conference. I enjoyed it quite a bit. I went for a run in Central Park one morning and came across a grove of American Elm trees. Our tree in the backyard is an American Elm, and we’re fortunate that it hasn’t been affected by Dutch Elm disease. To see a whole grove of American Elms is pretty cool. We got these buttons at the conference. It’s fun being surrounded by people who all love metadata. I stayed at the Pod51 hotel…

We have a 3-day weekend so I thought I’d catch up on some blog posts. About a month ago when Liam was home for the weekend we took some portraits in the back yard. Since then, Miles has had a haircut and it’s warmed up about 20 degrees F – it was probably 60 degrees F / 18 degrees C that day, whereas today it’s 80 degrees F / 30 degrees C. Also our tree is now in full leaf. We started with a study in perspective. “Father Ted” fans will be reminded of the caravan holiday scene where Ted spent…

Like everyone else we wanted to see the Broadway musical Hamilton in New York, but tickets are a combination of impossible to get and crazy high prices sold by ticket resellers. Plus it’s coming to Chicago later this year so we made what I think was a very mature decision to wait on Hamilton and see Fun Home on Broadway instead. It was a really fantastic play, based on a graphic novel by Alison bechdel ( assigned reading before the play). Graphic novel and play are both highly recommended!  We also took a walk on the High line, new york’s…

Monday we spent the first part of the day in lower Manhattan. We saw the 9/11 memorials at the   trade center site, which we thought were pretty powerful.     There are pools for each of the former twin towers buildings, with water running down the sides and another pool in the center. There’s also a new train station in the area, built by Spanish architect  calatrava. Readers might notice the similarities to the art museum in Milwaukee! Same architect but this building won’t have the ability to move like the Milwaukee one does.         We saw some historical…

Sunday we started off with a subway ride to Manhattan, where we rented bikes in Central Park. The women’s half marathon was on and it was fun to ride alongside the runners ( except maybe the time when it was runners, bikers, and horses and buggies a bit too close together…) here’s miles checking for the nearest coffee shop.       We circled the park on the inner drive area and then returned the bikes and started walking toward the upper east side, where our friends Vanessa and will and their daughter Issy live.       Animals in Central Park  Stopping at…

We left O’Hare the first Saturday morning of Chicago public schools spring break, and met what seemed like 400,000 families at the airport! Crazy long security lines but we got to our flight on time. Phew!  We went straight to Williamsburg, the neighborhood in Brooklyn where we’re staying. First stop: smorgasburg, a big open air market with about 75 food stands. We all chose different food (Japanese noodles or me, arepas for John and for miles: one of the most popular stands. I don’t know what his dish was called but it was a bowl of fried mashed plantains with…

We made plans to go out to a “new” restaurant on Sunday – only to realize when we got there that we’d been there before. Who can keep track of ramen restaurants in Logan Square anyway? It was delish. They have a noodle Sunday special that Liam and Miles got – really flavorful noodle based soups. See the massive lumpy thing to the side of Miles and me in the photo below? It’s several huge candles all drippy with dried wax. Bravo, Miles, for not indulging in the urge to pick at it during dinner! Very tempting! I had a…

While Liam was traveling cross country, lots of other people had traveled across the world to all gather and celebrate Nan’s birthday. While we were sorry to not be there in person, it was great to drop in via skype and get to say happy birthday to Nan! Along the back row in the photo, David came in from Vancouver, Colette from Sydney and Robert from India. International group! Nan with lots of her grand and great-grandchildren! What a cool cake.

We had a pretty uneventful week here while Liam and his friends went on a big trip last week! Hopefully his schedule will allow a blog post with photos from his trip soon. In the meantime, I can share a few maps showing where they went. Starting in Urbana-Champaign, he took a train to Chicago, then drove with one friend to St Louis, where they picked up two other friends. The four of them drove to Big Bend National Park (marked Texas 118 by Google on the maps), then to Corpus Christi (to swim in the Gulf), to Austin (for…

What says spring more than a college student coming home over spring break? That visit coinciding with a new composter in the quickly thawing back garden! Liam arrived home on Saturday to spend a few days with us before heading off on a camping trip with some college friends. We had a really nice day here, with the goals of the day being to set up our new composter, smoke some ribs and generally soak up the sun in the back garden. The tumbler composter that was very nicely given to us by family friend Bruce at least 10 years…