November 11, 2011

snippits of the week

Sign of the week. Found downtown outside a pub. This version is a bit more direct than the "Please Curb Your Dog" signs we have up here. We're such pansies uptown.
Also, "Canyons of Wall Street." I totally get that now.
Over the weekend, the kids and I took a train (or two, actually) down to the Nordic Center, otherwise known as Scandinavia House.

My mom and I found this place when we came for a girls weekend a few years ago and ate the most wonderful dinner there and I've been wanting to go back ever since and their Scandinavian Folk Story Time seemed the perfect excuse. The plan was to stay for a snack but by the time it was over Briton was feeling lousy so home we went.
But not before we dropped a quarter in the very first Salvation Army bucket of the season and spent a few minutes staring at the ceiling of Grand Central Station.
Briton and I are studying the Revolutionary War and what parts of it happened here in New York right now, so the two of us headed downtown and went on a hunt for Revolutionary New York. We walked along Wall Street and saw the spot where Washington was sworn in as the first president. Wandered through Trinity Church and Bowling Green and the old Common.
We did a few rubbings on some of the graves from the time period. Lots of history. Lots of fun. (we also went to The Strand Bookstore which reminded me so much of Powell's Books in Portland! It even smelled like Powell's. I could have stayed all day...)
We also went to St. Paul's which, besides surviving the Revolutionary War, Hosting Washington's Inaugural prayer Service and making it through the great fire of 1776, was right next to the World Trade Center. I've seen it from the memorial side and it's hard to imagine how it survived the towers falling, but it did. And inside there are still pews that have scuff-marks from the boots of the first responders when they had to rest and signs that people posted, looking for lost loved ones, and strings and strings of cranes, folded by people around the world in memory. Although Briton understands what happened and continues to ask, often, about that day, the display inside St. Paul's was a little beyond him. But it was wonderful, and so very sad, for me.
Have a lovely weekend all.