The Upper East Side

We enjoyed a gorgeous spring day in NYC.  We took Metro North into Grand Central Station.

The ceiling in the main room never gets old.  We took a quick detour to the little museum/gift shop to see the quilt exhibit.  GCS is celebrating their 100 anniversary and they had a quilt challenge.  It was fun to see how quilters used fabrics and motifs in the small wall quilts.

From there, we walked to Rockefeller Center and to the mega Lego store.  All around the skating rink is an exhibit of eggs, in the Faberge style.

They reminded me to the differently painted Olympic mascots that were all over London in 2012.  I must have taken about 30 pictures of different eggs.

My favorite

Butterflies for Grampy Robert

Maps!

We decided to visit the Lego store first so that Selim would have some satisfaction before going to the Metropolitan Museum of Art.  He bought a Star Wars thing and happily continued with his day.  Last year we took our picture outside of the store, so here is the two of us a year later.

We walked to the subway at Lexington and 51 Street.  A minutes later, we got off at 86 Street and walked to the Met.  Heather took Joshua and Selim to the Egyptian section and I went to the Lost Kingdoms exhibit.  I wanted to see the Buddha sculptures.  May be I was hungry, or tired, or not exactly in the right frame of mind to enjoy the pieces.  But the room was dark, with spotlights dramatically illuminating the art, and I had trouble reading the descriptions.  And there were fewer Buddha pieces and more Vishnu and Shiva than I had expected.  There were benches in front of pieces that I didn't find very compelling and no place to linger and contemplate in front of the ones that drew me in.  May be I should get a Buddha for my garden and call it a day.  Or better yet, I should just go over to Mom's and sit in front of the apple tree garden and enjoy her flowers and small Buddha.

I met up with Heather and the boys in the cafeteria.  Fortified, we went to the Arms and Armor gallery.  Score!  The boys loved it and I really enjoyed it as well.  Tons of photo opportunities in those rooms.

I nicknamed him rat face.

Marching through the gallery

Prayers to Allah inscribed within the armor itself.

The other activity planned for the day was a few blocks of Central Park.  We stopped at the Alice and Wonderland statue,

and the Hans Christian Anderson.

We are done!

And then my favorite, the underground section of the Bethesda Terrace.  Why archways and tile sooth my insides,  I have no idea.  But I could have stayed in there a long time, provided I had brought something to sit on.  There was a  cellist playing at one of the entryways and his music filled the space.  Magical.  A balm.  Cross between reminders of India and Turkey.  Heather took the boys for ice cream as I lingered.

On sore feet and tired hips, we made our way out of the Park (taking one last selfie) and back to the subway at 68 Street.  Our timing was perfect in that we made the last off-peak train out of the city to Heather's.

A lovely day and a great way to spend part of our vacation.