Fun places to explore with kids-Israel

We spent April-June in Tel Aviv, Israel a few years back and loved it! My husband was working with the New Israeli Opera and had a few concerts with the Jerusalem Symphony.   We had an apartment about two blocks from this beach, which we did not mind at all.  We were delighted by many, many things in Israel.  

My stroller obsession really started in Israel. This is the stroller we brought, which we realized was a bit of a joke. In Tel Aviv we were walking 1-3 hours a day. Our son did not seem comfortable for sleep, and this stroller was very much made shorter people than my husband and me. A few months earlier, my husband was working in Detroit where my college friend who taught me to fire breath lived. She introduced me to phil&teds by giving me a stroller demo in her living room. I emailed her to find out more as I needed a better stroller. I started doing my research on-line and found an e3 on ebay. I made a bid, assuming I would not win, but the next morning I woke up as the owner of a new phil&teds!! Sadly since we were in Israel (and then traveling to England and Mexico), I could not have it shipped to me. I would have to wait  few months to use my new toy. In the mean time, we upgraded to a great Spanish made stroller in Israel. We liked it for the full recline and the fat wheels.  Below, we are outside the walls of Jerusalem with a stroller we could comfortably push for hours a day while waiting for our phil&teds.   
A few Tel Aviv favorites:  Carmel Market!!

This place is amazing, and as you can tell, we were very excited by the gummy candy.  The produce was spectacular, so fresh and flavorful.  On the weekends, there frequently would be craft and artisan  fairs at the market. We bought my son a little pop up toy there that is still a favorite almost 6 years later.       

An easy Tel Aviv favorite, the gorgeous BEACH!! 

 

And although it was about an hour walk from our apartment, if you follow the beach you can walk to Jaffa.  Jaffa feels much older and we loved the contrast to modern Tel Aviv.  I would LOVE an hour to walk along that beach right now.   

 

In Jaffa, we were wandering around some alleys with lots of artist galleries and came upon this hanging tree.  This is one of my most favorite photos of my little boy.  

Below, yet another Tel Aviv favorite, walking on Dizengoff.  

We had heard that Dizengoff used to be the main thoroughfare in Tel Aviv, before the shopping malls.  There is still excellent window shopping, like the crazy dress below.    

 

And, it is very worth it to go out of your way to visit this juice bar called Tamara.  It is where Ben Gurion boulevard crosses Dizengoff.  One of my favorites was to get the watermelon and fresh mint smoothie, which just tastes like summer to me.  This place was always busy and for good reason.  

We spent a few days in Jerusalem, which was an amazing maze and extremely beautiful city.  It is impressive that tourists have been coming here for thousands of years.  

We also spent a day at the Dead Sea.  We learned they do not allow little kids in the water as if they swallow too much, it can be fatal.  And I learned that if I cover myself in mud, my child may be a bit alarmed by muddy mommy.   

On a bit of a tangent, we have a running little joke with this Skipper shirt.  I got the shirt from my brother years ago.  Since it photographs so well, I started taking it on trips to see how far Skipper could go.  Once I started nursing, Brian took over on Skipper duty as the effects of nursing were a bit intense on Skipper.  He wore Skipper to a rehearsal when a photographer was taking candid photos for the program.  Much to our delight, Skipper made it into the Israeli opera program.  We have Skipper photos from around the world, and it makes me giggle.  

Traveling with the non-traveler!

With my husband's operatic career, we have had the good fortune to spend the past few years traveling far and wide as a family.  Once baby #3 and more serious schooling for our oldest son started, we have shifted to more time at home than traveling.   When the chance to visit my husband with only our baby for one of his performances in Bar Harbor, Maine this summer came up, I was delighted and nervous! I had never been to Maine (we live in the Western United States, and where we were going in Maine is the furthest Eastern part of the USA.  We even when up a mountain where the sun first hits our country!)   Baby Kate does not adjust to new places as well as the traveling kids.  Since she has not traveled, I had no idea what to expect.   Thankfully, she was an angel on the longest leg of my airplane travel.   However, when we were settling in for the first night at our bed and breakfast, she was just getting ready to play.  We had to pile her into our rental car for a sleepy drive in the middle of the night. 

In Maine, you eat LOBSTER!!  Below is Kate enjoying her first claw.  

 

I am thankful I brought my Wriggle Wrapper for two reasons.  #1, the night of the opera, I realized I forgot to pack a non-diaper bag purse. (I have a little clutch I usually bring where I keep my collection of ticket stubs.)  The Wriggle Wrapper served to hold my keys, wallet, cell phone, lipsitck, etc.  And reason #2, our wonderful bed and breakfast did have a booster-type baby chair, but no way to keep a squirmy 11 month on in it.  Go Wriggle Wrapper!!

 

We spent as much time as we could in the Arcadia National Park, exploring the hiking and carriage trails. 

 

 

We also timed it so as to walk out the sandbar to Bar Island.  In low tide you can walk out and hike around there, but make sure to not get stuck once the tide comes. 

 
Poor tired baby, so much packed into just a few days!  It's not a phil&teds product, but we have used this great strap to carry Kate's infant car seat hands free.  She's getting heavy and this in no way replaces baby wearing, but it's been a lifesaver! 

So now baby Kate some some travel under her belt! It's never ideal to travel with kids, but it's possible!    

Wriggle Wrapper!

We have been finding fun ways to use our Wriggle Wrapper with our now 8 month old baby Kate!  She is of course, always supervised by a parent.  Kate loves being a big kid in our little car.  She is very entertained watching big brother and sister ride bikes, trikes, and scooters.  

 

And above, my Mom has this great rocking swan that Kate loves to ride.  She rocks it like a pro.  She also sits up in her Grandpa's old red high chair.

I may have mentioned this, but a couple Christmases ago I bought the Wriggle Wrapper as a joke gift for my husband since I wanted it.  It became less of a joke when I found out I was pregnant with Kate on Christmas Eve.  It has been great to have around, very versatile product at home or out and about.  

Out-numbered by our children

The transition to three kids has been wild! So wild in fact, that I started writing this post in early November and now it is late January. The early newborn period is always a little tricky for me but we are through the most difficult and have figured a few things out. It is nice have parenting experience so we don't need to panic about normal baby things, but funny to me how many things we are re-learning. It is like each kids is their own little person (which I say sarcastically, of course they are! With their own sets of great things and hard things).

Our baby Kate is just about the cutest baby ever, not that I am biased! I could just sit around and coo and nibble on her cute chubby body all day long. The tricky thing is, she has these two older siblings who need to go to school, have clean clothes and food. For all of Kate's extreme cuteness, she is a terrible at taking naps! I had hoped that by our third child we would know how to help them sleep but alas, no. Each of our kids have brought very different sleep challenges. She is a great sleeper if I can lay down with her or hold her all day but that can't always happen. She just loves us too much and always wants us close. Hopefully this will instill in her a great sense of security and love. However in the meantime, I just don't get much done.

Our sweet little 3 year old Jane has had more of an adjustment than we anticipated. Can't you just see the spark of naughtiness in her eyes? Overall she has done great, but we have some difficult moments every now and again with our willful Jane. We hope her willfulness will turn into great perseverance. There have been many times since she became a big sister where we have to collect her off the floor or leave somewhere with her screaming. My husband was shopping with her recently when she had a tantrum so spectacular that a stranger asked him if he needed help restraining her. Are not those the best parenting moments?

Our nearly 6 year old Colin has been an extremely sweet big brother to the new baby. (If only he could be so sweet to his 3 year old sister!) He is very attentive and soft. He loves to make the baby giggle and cuddle and help out. He has always loved little babies and adores his baby sister.

And when your Daddy is a musician, the wriggle wrapper is going to used for piano playing. Kind of funny, for Christmas of 2010, I gave Brian the wriggle wrapper as a joke because I wanted it. On Christmas Eve, we found out we were expecting (which was a few months sooner than we had hoped) so the wriggle wrapper became less of a joke. The positive pregnancy test did make the package of condoms I had bought for Brian redundant.

And so the real adventure begins parenting all these kids! I have great admiration for Moms of many children! (And I know lots have many, many more than I do!)

No more waiting

Since I had complained about the waiting game of the end of pregnancy I wanted to report that thankfully it did come to a nice ending with our lovely third daughter a few weeks ago. The past month has been a blur of not much sleep and lots of nursing and diapers, but we get to cuddle a very cute little baby!

Our phil&teds Explorer came in handy even while I was in labor. My water broke early in the morning on our son's first day of kindergarten. I thought labor might go really fast like it did with my second child. We headed to our birth center, but things stopped progressing. We decided to come home and made our kids a pancake breakfast. We then loaded our 3 year old in the stroller and walked a mile to get Colin to school. I think the walk helped get things moving again, and our new little girl joined us a few short hours later. I can now add to the reason I like phil&teds, they helped me not be pregnant anymore!

Here I am with my son at school, in labor and in all my huge pregnant glory! It feels so good to not be pregnant anymore! I have extreme respect for the moms of multiples as I can barely handle gestating just one baby!

Now we begin our real parenthood adventure as we are outnumbered by our children!

Fun cities to explore with kids-Mexico City

As we are home a bit more with a new baby and a more serious school schedule, I thought it would be fun to outline kid friendly things to do in some of our favorite cities. We do have 3 trips planned for the last few months of the year, can't stay still too long!

First stop in fun cities to explore with kids, Mexico City, Mexico!!

With kids in Mexico City head directly to el Bosque de Chapultepec!! We had an apartment in Zona Rosa, just a short walk from this truly amazing park. The size of Chapultepec makes New York's Central Park seem like a small community park; Wikipedia tells us it is Latin America's largest park. Get to the amazing free zoo as soon as you can!

The Chapultepec Zoo is a very impressive zoo with great animal habitats and some rare to see animals like pandas and condors. We also loved the monkeys! Our son was only about a year and a half at the time and in his vocab, all the animals were either doggies, kitties, or birds.

How sweet is that baby monkey!

The zoo also has a lovely butterfly and insect exhibit, which requires an extra ticket but is very reasonable and worth it. We loved being so close to all the beautiful butterflies and gross bugs.

Also located near Chapultepec is the Papalote Museo del nino, the Children's Museum of Mexico City. It is a massive wonderland of all things fun. We adore children's museums but wonder if it is a little confusing for our little ones. Suddenly they have a place where they can play with everything and then we go back to the real world where they cannot touch everything.

Our very pale blond little boy got lots of attention in Mexico!

One of our favorite places in the museum was the bubble room! Completely fun and amazing! My husband and I would have spent a lot of time playing in here even without our son.

If you have time while in Mexico City, make sure and head to the ruins of Teotihuacan! Just a short drive out of the city and completely incredible!

Here are Brian and Colin climbing the Pyramid of the Sun. So sad Colin will not remember this place, hope we can go back when he is older. My mom can empathize with Colin's young adventures. She was born in Chile and by the time she was 7 years old had traveled all over Latin America but sadly, does not remember much. She knows what it is like to be told all of the places she has been that she does not recall.

Me walking down the Calle de los muertos, the Street of the Dead, trying to not get a sunburn. The Pyramid of the Moon is at the end of the road. Teotihucan was a huge city, so many fun places to explore and climb.

While in Mexico, don't forget to catch some Mariachis! Can't go wrong at the Anthropology Museum also.

Viva Mexico!!