This one's for you Susan...

It has taken us a while to settle in, recover from jet lag and the terrible flu we came home with from New York. The heat has taken some getting used to! Two days ago we had a record breaking day with soaring temperatures of 45 degrees Celsius or 113 in Fahrenheit, in Wollongong. The kids have been loving the beach and are loving the surf.

Can't wait to hear of any travel plans you have. We miss you!!!

Arriving Home...

We had a wonderful time in New York and were ready to head for home. Arriving at the airport three hours plus before our flight of six hours to LA and then a two hour layover before embarking on a fifteen hour final leg to Sydney was daunting!

It was great to land and be back on Australian soil.

Garry's nephew Nigel who works at Sydney airport was on site with his trusty camera to take the great shots of our Qantas flight landing. Thanks Nigel!

My dear friend Kerry was waiting for us and drove us and our large amount of luggage home. Kerry had thoughtfully been into our place and cleaned and shopped for us in preparation for our arrival. It is times like this when I am truly grateful for having such a good and considerate friend.

To say it was a shock to be home was an understatement. The humidity, heat and strong scent of the ocean were soooo different from New York City. I went for a walk down to the Fish Coop to buy some prawns for dinner. I stopped to take a photograph of the Harbour for you Susan - its good to be home. I had forgotten just how lovely Wollongong is!

A Day at the MoMA....

Today we headed for the infamous Museum of Modern Art otherwise known as MoMA. It was another cold start to the day.

Being New Year's Eve we thought that today would possibly be a good day to visit as the crowds might be down. We lined up for more than half an hour just to purchase admission tickets.

Then we were shocked at the hour plus line for the cloak room! We were exhausted before we even began!

This is an amazing building, housing wonderful artworks. We spent the morning exploring and again our two little artists were at their best.

We headed across the road and enjoyed a sumptuous meal at an Irish Pup. Garry enjoyed his first real Bangers and Mash in over a year.

Back inside Max and I had a great time creating our own images with our bodies that were projected onto a giant white wall.

We headed out the back to the Education Centre which was almost empty. Down the stairs and we arrived at the children's exploration centre. This was great - the kids explored various media and really had some fun making art.

Mas particularly enjoyed creating his own T Rex shadow puppet and then played with it behind the  Shadow Puppet Screen.

Our visit to MoMA ended with a walk through the beautiful external, sculpture garden. Max hammed it up for the camera at his fathers request.

It was a great, but long day. Yasemin was wrecked, and had to have a rest on the subway ride home. This was a great way to spend the last day of 2012.

Picasso and The Guggenheim....

I have wanted to visit the Guggenheim for such a long time and today I was able to combine this amazing gallery and Picasso! Wow!!! Snow was on the ground and it was freezing outside - thankfully we were arriving early in the day and were able to walk in without lining up outside.

I was excited about the Picasso Exhibition and the Kids were excited with the family bag which included a scavenger hunt for artworks, jigsaw puzzle and individual sketchbooks and pencils - on loan for free!

Feeling overwhelmed by the beauty of Frank Loyd Wrights architecture we began our climb. I really didn't know where to look first.

The view from the ground floor up was simply beautiful.

Picasso's exhibition was titled, "Black and White". Yasemin quickly selected a painting she liked and both kids sat down and began to complete their own drawings. Yasemin created a beautiful sketch of the painting in front of her while Max worked o his own memory drawings of The Empire State Building.

The view from the top looking down was superb.

We wandered admiring both the artworks and architecture.

As we drifted into early afternoon the gallery was super crowded, and it was time to exit. Outside it was freezing - I can't remember Denver ever being this cold.

We walked across the road to Central Park, but realised it was way to cold to walk and explore so we headed for the warmth of a restaurant for a late lunch.

Re-fuelled and slightly more energetic we explored Times Square again and soaked at some of the atmosphere before heading for home. Max has been intrigued with the Statue of Liberty since we saw her on Christmas Day and I couldn't resist a photo.