Father’s Day in New York

Hello, everyone! I hope your week is off to a good start! I know mine is cranking along…I’m swamped at work already! However, before I get into any of that, let me tell you about my weekend.

It was spent in this awesome city:

Or at least, in the suburbs outside of the city. Yep, that’s the good old New York City skyline. Here’s another picture:

(Check out the graveyard in the photo above! If you’ve never seen one of these graveyards on the outskirts of the city they are epic; so old and crammed in! They are definitely a bit creepy.)

Fun Fact: I actually lived in Manhattan one summer while I interned at a Fashion PR firm in Soho. Although it was a good experience, it made me realize that NYC was a little too intense for my taste (I wonder if it had anything to do with the homeless shelter I lived next to?) and I prefer the quieter life of living right outside of a big city. Hence why I love living in Arlington, VA, which is a 10-minute walk from DC but isn’t technically in the city. I need my trees and grass!!

Anyway, let’s rewind to Friday night. After work I headed home, packed up my stuff, and hopped in the car around 7:00 pm to start our trek to New York to visit Fabio’s dad for Father’s Day. I am so lucky that I get to see my family all the time, whereas Fabio only sees his family every few months. Therefore, I happily went along with him this weekend knowing that I would celebrate Father’s Day with my dad next weekend

First we stopped in Baltimore to pick up Fabio’s sister Diane. The three of us made pretty great time until we reached the Verazzano bridge where they were doing a ton of construction. The two right lanes were closed and the left lane was being closed off periodically by one of those construction workers holding a sign that says “stop” on one side and “slow” on the other. When we finally got over the bridge, we encountered more traffic on the Belt Parkway (obviously). If you’ve ever driven on the Belt Parkway, then you KNOW there is always traffic. We didn’t wind up getting to Fabio’s dad’s house in Queens until 2:00 am and we were pooped! We fell right into bed.

The next morning we had plans to go to Fabio’s Uncle Mike’s house in Stoneybrook, Long Island. We picked up a bunch of stuff to grill and had a great afternoon munching on BBQed meats and veggies and sipping on chilled white wine

Fabio was the grill master while the rest of us relaxed in the shade.

Fabio’s cousin brought her daughter, Mia, who was born in February. We had so much fun playing with her!

What a munchkin!

His aunt was also visiting from Colombia so it was great seeing her as well. Unfortunately she doesn’t speak much English and I don’t speak much Spanish so our conversations were pretty limited. She did tell me about a website that she’s been using to improve her English, so I’ll have to check it out for my Spanish! It’s too bad those Rosetta Stone programs are so expensive.

Fabio’s dad and Uncle Mike also made fun of the silly faces baby Mia was making (plus they are all bald lol).

Someone commented that it looked like the Hangover! Haha.

Uncle Mike also has a pool, but none of us felt much like swimming.

Honestly though I was surprised Jack didn’t go in. We all know what a good swimmer he is! He had fun chasing around their little chiwawa, Gizmo!

In between the BBQing and relaxing outside, Fabio and Uncle Mike caught some of the  13-inning Nats vs. Yankees game (or was it 14 innings? I forget). Originally Fabio and I weren’t planning to go up to NY this weekend and we wanted to get tickets for the game (he is a HUGE Yankee fan) but I am incredibly happy that we didn’t because I would have gone nuts sitting there for all those innings. Yikes!

After spending the day at Uncle Mike’s, we headed to the North Shore Animal League (which happened to be right near where we rescued Jack) to look for a dog for Fabio’s dad. In the past 6 months he had to put to sleep his miniature American Eskimo and his Pomeranian because of old age. Right now he has a toy Yorkie, pictured above, but he’s used to having a couple of dogs around and we thought it would be a good idea to get him a new dog for Father’s Day.

The shelter is huge and we’d been before, so stopped by to see what kind of dogs they had. Oh My Gosh. The amount of adorable puppies and adult dogs they had melted my heart. We saw tons of adorable energetic adult dogs as well as loving, finger-nibbling puppies. I wanted them all. I had to be careful not to adopt any more dogs myself!!

We immediately saw an adorable little Bichon Frise that looked perfect for Fabio’s dad. They are a great breed and we actually recommended that type of dog to him before (thank you Dogs 101 for teaching me about them haha). She’s a three-year old who was rescued from a puppy mill and although she is skiddish of humans, she does really well with other dogs. The fact that Fabio’s dad already has the Yorkie made him a perfect candidate to adopt her. Once all the paperwork was finalized, we took her back to the house and named her Misty!

She is such a sweetheart and although it took her a while to warm up to us, she eventually came out of her cage and sniffed around. I think it will take a long time for her to totally trust humans, but it was so great that Fabio’s dad was able to give her a loving home.

We spent Saturday evening playing with the new puppy and watching Saturday Night Live together. On Sunday morning we had a nice brunch with Fabio’s other sister Karen and then packed up the car to head back to Arlington. We left around 4:00 pm and arrived home by 9:00 after dropping Diane off in Baltimore. Then Fabio and I unpacked the car and relaxed a little before bed (I made some great progress in my book!).

Anyway, that’s how my weekend went! Now I am glad to be back home and get back to my normal schedule and, most importantly, to sleep in my own bed. Ah…

So, how did your weekend go? Did you travel anywhere far? Have you ever been to NY? How about stuck on the Belt Parkway haha…