Adventures in the City

Recently I just moved to New York for a new job. I work in upper Winchester county of New York. I nanny for 4 kids. 
I got the opportunity a couple of weeks ago to spend the weekend with my cousin who is living in New York for a year. Its nice having family around. I went up early Saturday and I took the subway for the first time by myself. I was very proud and didn't get lost. I got to her place and after we went exploring. 
First we went to Governors Island. Governors Island is a 172-acre island in New York Harbor, approximately 800 yards from the southern tip of Manhattan Island and separated from Brooklyn by the Buttermilk Channel. We walked around the island and from part of it we could see the Brooklyn Bridge and the Statue of Liberty. 

Hammocks Governors Island

Governors Island seeing Statue of Liberty

Brooklyn Bridge from Ferry 

Manhattan from Governors Island

Statue Of Liberty

Cousins 

After Governors Island we went to Wall Street and saw the Bull. Charging Bull, which is sometimes referred to as the Wall Street Bull or the Bowling Green Bull, is a bronze sculpture that stands in Bowling Green in the Financial District in Manhattan, New York City.Then we went to dinner at a fun little restaurant. I don't remember the name. It was a bar style restaurant. We took the subway to get everywhere we need to go. While on one subway I noticed that the subway car was empty so my cousins and I went in. We noticed a potent smell. Their was a homeless man on it and since he was stinky the lots people got out and went to another car. 

Lastly we walked across the Brooklyn Bridge to the Twin Tower memorial sight. I really enjoyed the 9/11 sight. I remember to this day how old I was and what I was doing. I was in 5th grade and my teachers turned on the TV and we watched the news. 

Brooklyn Bridge with my cousin

Statue of Liberty from Brooklyn Bridge

Brooklyn Bridge 

New York City at Night 

9/11 Memorial at Night 

Lastly my LDS YSA ward had a special Stake Conference at Lincoln Square which was cool as I got to see the Manhattan Temple.

Manhattan Temple

The next week my LDS YSA ward did a ward activity and we went apple picking on Long Island at Hanks pumpkin patch.

Pumpkins 

A cow

It's Never Goodbye, It's See You Later

"I never like to say goodbye so instead I would like to say see you later" Grandpa Allred. I’ve been nannying with this family for almost two years and it makes me sad to say goodbye. I’ve been able to work with two families over the past two years. One I did part time and the other I live with. I'm grateful that I could have met such an amazing family and grow and loved them just like my own. I got to experience some of my firsts in life with this family. I love that they’re a different culture and got to experience events with them including Kosher, holidays, weddings, and growing up. I grew to love that family and their extended family which was a great thing for me. I even got to nanny for a cousin and that was fun.  

I got to experience up and downs. For example I learned how to be more patience with the children. I got to see four kids have birthday, experience life events, and much more. I loved the experience I got to have by bonding with each child and getting to know them each one by one. I got to experience some trials in my life and I grew from them.

I met some really amazing people in my Baltimore YSA ward which was such a fun experience.Nothing will be quite like this amazing ward. I participated in three  different callings and got to grow and meet some amazing people. I love all the friends I got to make and got to take some amazing adventures with them. I even met another fellow nanny and bonding over the same thing. I loved getting to go to Washington DC and experience a life here on the east coast.

It’s been a fun two years and I’m hoping to see the family again. The family will always have a special place in my heart. It’s not over yet I get experience a new adventure in New York!!

The four best F words ever: Food, Friends, 4th of July, Fireworks

For the 4th of July weekend I usually go back to Utah and spend time with my family.
This year was different, I stayed in Maryland and I took the opportunity to see the fireworks at the National Mall.
A group of girls from my ward decided to go together. We met up at the metro station in College Park, Maryland and rode the metro to the Archives stop in DC. We walked around and went into some of the museums. We went into the Museum of National History. We went into the Museum to since it was earlier enough and we wanted to see Dinosaur exhibit. 
It started to rain and I forgot to pack a rain jacket, so I bought a rain poncho.
After enjoying the Mall we found a place to sit near the Washington Monument. In choosing this place we had to go through security. I packed a blanket to sit on. The fireworks didn't start until 9:00, so we just sat and talked.
As I was sitting down a friend of mine, that I know from Baltimore, approached me and we had a nice conversation. It's a small world seeing people at unexpected places. The fireworks were amazing. They had fireworks in the shape of smile faces and they had some in the shape of squares.

Washington Monument

 

This lady was all dressed out for the 4th

look at all the people

My friend from way back

Friends-Madi, Amy, Me, Sydnie 

I Looked out the Window

Saturday I woke up in a good mood. My friend texted me and asked if I wanted to go to the DC Cherry Blossoms Festival and I said, "YES!".
"The National Cherry Blossom Festival is Washington, DC’s and the nation’s greatest springtime celebration that annually celebrates the gift of the cherry blossom trees and their symbol of enduring friendship between the citizens of Japan and the United States. Timed in conjunction with the peak blooming period of the trees, the city-wide event attracts visitors and area residents to hundreds of events in partnership with more than 30 local organizations."
http://www.nationalcherryblossomfestival.org/visitor-information/faq/
She picked me up and we drove to DC. We had a fun time on the drive, seeing DC. We parked and sat by the Jefferson Memorial while we waited for another one of our friends.
While sitting there I was people watching and I thought I recognized someone in the crowds. It was an old friend from my home ward I grew up in. Her name is Beka Stevens Coleman. What a small world!

Later our friend came and we walked and saw all the pretty blossoms. We got amazing pictures.




After we were craving ice cream, so we got soft served ice cream cones. We sat and talked, while we devoured our cool treat . Later, after we let our feet rest for a bit, we decided to go to the Museum of National History. Once there we went the Butterfly exhibit, to the Butterfly Pavilion.
"The Butterfly Pavilion is a brightly lit space filled with living plants and many different butterflies. The climate-controlled environment is kept at 80^oF, and 80% humidity. It is handicap accessible. However, neither strollers nor tripods are permitted in the space.  Once in the Pavilion, there is nothing but air between the visitor and the butterflies.  They fly freely around the enclosure landing on plants and sometimes people, and they feed on fruit and nectar.  The butterflies come from a variety of butterfly farms located around the world.  Visitors can get very close to these beautiful creatures, watching them fly and feed.  A case of hanging chrysalids makes it possible to see crumple-winged butterflies emerge as adults, pump fluid into their wings, and eventually fly off."
https://naturalhistory.si.edu/butterflies/tickets/
We were in that room where we could see butterflies flying all around us. They even landed on other people. I must confess, I found out I was afraid of them landing of me.


After  I drove home, I went to the Women's General Meeting of the General Conference of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints.

"We are the shoes, We are the last witness."

It all started on Friday. I got the opportunity, to join with the family I work with, to go to Washington D.C. area for a bat Mitzvah. Friday I worked.
Saturday I went to into the city, since I didn't have to work. The hotel I was staying at was only 3 miles from D.C. So I put on my walking shoes and took a little journey. It was a fun walk. I contacted one of my friends and she decided to meet me at the Holocaust Museum. I got there early, so I waited in line and chatted with the group in front of me. There was a couple of college students there and we talked. (what about? why bring them up? If it isn't really relate-able to what you are trying to say delete it) I met this really nice girl from Chicago, she was going to the University of Illinois.
My friend came right on time, just before I reached the entrance. We went in and got a card. This card described a person who went through the Holocaust.
First to explain what the Holocaust Museum is:
"In 1933, the Jewish population of Europe stood at over nine million people. Most European Jews lived in countries that Nazi Germany would occupy or influence during World War II. By 1945, the Germans and their collaborators killed nearly two out of every three European Jews, as part of the "Final Solution," the Nazi policy to murder the Jews of Europe.
"Although Jews, whom the Nazis deemed a priority danger to Germany, were the primary victims of Nazi racism, other victims included some 200,000 Roma (Gypsies). At least 200,000 mentally or physically disabled patients, mainly Germans, living in institutional settings, were murdered.
"As Nazi tyranny spread across Europe, the Germans and their collaborators persecuted and murdered millions of other people. Between two and three million Soviet prisoners of war were murdered or died of starvation, disease, neglect, or maltreatment. The Germans targeted the non-Jewish Polish intelligentsia for killing, and deported millions of Polish and Soviet civilians for forced labor in Germany or in occupied Poland, where these individuals worked and often died under deplorable conditions.
"From the earliest years of the Nazi regime, German authorities persecuted homosexuals and others whose behavior did not match prescribed social norms. German police officials targeted thousands of political opponents (including Communists, Socialists, and trade unionists) and religious dissidents (such as Jehovah's Witnesses). Many of these individuals died as a result of incarceration and maltreatment. "
(https://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/article.php?ModuleId=10005143)
Hitler wanted a perfect person of blue eyes and blond hair, the Aryan race. So everyone else was sent to a camp. Family that had children of the perfect person hid their kids.
During the tour of the museum there was over 12 hours of material, my friend and I spend around 2 hours in there.
During a section of the museum there was lots of shoes. The Nazis took all of the shoes of the people they would burn. and that is were the quotes comes from.
"We are the shoes, we are the last witnesses. We are the shoes from grandfathers from Prague, and Amsterdam, and because we are the only made of fabric and leather and not of blood and flesh, each one of us avoided the hellfire." -Yiddish Poet Moses Schulstein

After I walked through the tower of pictures, shown below. It's three-stories tall,  displaying photographs from the Yaffa Eliach Shtetl Collection. These photos, taken between 1890 and 1941 in Eishishok, a small town in what is now Lithuania, depict a vibrant Jewish community that existed for 900 years. In 1941, an SS mobile killing squad entered the village and within two days massacred the Jewish population

At the end there was this quote. Speak out!

After the Holocaust Museum we went to the National Museum of American History and show Dorothy Slippers. We also the hall of The First Ladies. This was a hall all about the first ladies. First Ladies explores the unofficial but important position of first lady and the ways that different women have shaped the role to make their own contributions to the presidential administrations and the nation. The exhibition features more than two dozen gowns from the Smithsonian’s almost 100-year old First Ladies Collection, including those worn by Frances Cleveland, Lou Hoover, Jacqueline Kennedy, Laura Bush, and Michelle Obama. A section titled “Changing Times, Changing First Ladies” highlights the roles played by Dolley Madison, Mary Lincoln, Edith Roosevelt, and Lady Bird Johnson and their contributions to their husband’s administrations. 

A Blessing In Disguise

Sorry I haven't written in a long time. I've been really busy.
This past weekend my friend and I decided to go on an adventure, in the cold. That day it snowed and when you are by the water its colder. We went down to the Inner Harbor, to visit the aquarium. We went up and saw that it was $39.95 for each ticket. We  decided it was too expensive to go into. Instead we decided to walk around the Inner Harbor and site see, visiting the mall near by, going into Barnes and Noble, and go out to lunch at a cute place called the Shake Shack. On the way walking back to our car this guy approached us and asked us if we wanted to go into the aquarium. Apparently he bought tickets for his friends and they didn't showing up. We took the tickets and went into the aquarium.
It's crazy that we really want to go and we ended up going for free!!