Long Island

Friday morning I accidentally made us sleep late. By that I mean Jackson quietly played on his iPhone while I slept until 9:30! Hey- you explore an entire city and see if you've still got early mornings in you.

Jackson and Kyle

We were fortunate enough to be able to hook up with my dear friend Kyle Feller for lunch at the Bryant Park Cafe. I've known Kyle since my freshman year of high school so it is always nice to catch up with him now that he's 35 and working in the big city. That nice young man even bought lunch for Jackson and I at this cafe which was not inexpensive. What a guy! (Note: we left the tip. Even we are not that shameless! ha!)

Kyle gave us directions on the scenic way to get to the train station to catch the 2:29 train out to visit another dear high school friend, Joe Walker. You may recall that we visited Joe when we lived in Southern California during our Christmas 2014 trip. Back then he and his wife "only" had two little girls. Now they have FOUR little girls! Holy cats that's a ton of little ones but they make it look so easy. They really are rockstars like that. 

Batting practice

Rosalie is almost 6, Ivy is 4, Daisy is 20 months and Violet is 7 weeks! They're all little treasures, too. Oh my goodness are these little ladies polite. The entire visit they called me "Miss Jenna" and would ask if we'd please play with them. We, of course, obliged. We had such a good time. We pitched and they batted. (Ok, mainly just Rose and Ivy. Daisy just ran around having a good time and Violet is a newborn so we let her hang with Momma most of the time!)

They taught me a new game (Jackson was horrified that I had never played) called "red light, green light, 1, 2, 3" which proved to be quite fun for all four of us.

SNUGGLES!

After dinner we all snuggled on the couch for a bit to watch some strange cartoon before heading back outside to continue the fun. We even got the squirt guns out and had a heck of a time. Please note the fight was unfair as Joe is a Marine trained in combat and we're mere civilians!! Ha! The little ladies were naturally on daddy's side so we got SOAKED. We had an awesome time. I taught the girls how to make themselves into burritos with the beach towels and they loved it. So funny. They all had baths while we caught up with Joe before heading back to the train station to head back to our hotel. Would you believe that with 4 kids those kind folks also made us dinner?! Seriously. I told you there were amazing. 

Wild girls!!

Oldest, youngest

This picture is priceless.
Ivy is faking, she was having an awesome time.
That lip, though!!

Our trip back to the city was a pretty quick one. I've become quite a train fan! We roamed around the city for a bit before admitting that it was like 9:30 and we were exhausted. We returned to the hotel and caught "The Martian" on HBO before calling it a night. (Good movie, by the way!) I know, guys, we are truly exciting. ;)