NYC with 5 year old and still a good time had by all...

Thanks to many of you we had a wonderful time in NYC this past weekend. The weather was cooler than we'd hoped, but we dressed accordingly and felt comfortable each day. I can't tell you how much I appreciated your suggestions; truly it made our trip run more smoothly and our eating experiences were just perfect!

Thursday we arrived around 6:30. My husband had a conference at the Ritz Battery Park. We have three very young children and finding childcare for all three of them is an issue; therefore we took our oldest son (age 5) along with us. We've never stayed downtown before so this was all new for us in many ways.

The Ritz is currently being renovated; surprisingly we saw no evidence of this during our stay. However, floors 1-6 are just finished and our room was only one week old! I've not had the privelege of staying in a brand new hotel room before, much less at a Ritz Carlton property. Pretty cool. The staff was, of course, amazing, and everything about the hotel was perfect except the food was ridiculously overpriced.

We walked across to Gigino for dinner--spectacular view of Lady Liberty as we ate. Staff was accomodating for our meal; food was good and very reasonably priced. Tiny restaurant, strange building. But a good experience and couldn't have been more convenient. We walked through Battery Park to Staten Island Ferry. Two men, each of different races, were shouting/preaching with a Bible to everyone as we were waiting. It was a cool experience. We were able to explain to our son that in our country we are free to express what we believe (even if it isn't exactly good manners to shout in public LOL). We rode the ferry over and my husband nearly teared up as he pointed to Lady Liberty (first time he'd ever seen her) and said to our son "she stands for liberty, which is why those men could yell about what they believe." It was really kind of cool. The ferry station, by the way, has been renovated since the last time I rode it (2004?)--much nicer than it used to be! We left there and walked back to the hotel, crashed for the night.

Husband had conference all day Friday, so son and I struck out to nearby market for quick breakfast (Zaytuna's, yummy hot pancakes), then headed on to Museum of Natural History. He loved the dinosaurs, as expected, and the planets and rocks more than I expected. We spent too long there, then headed to Shake Shack (another good Fodorite suggestion) for lunch. Then on to Children's Museum of Manhatten. Could've spent all day there, awesome hands-on children's museum. Loved it! Reasonably priced too. Took a cab back home, had a massive headache, needed a nap before dinner.

For dinner we ate at Vice Versa. I was amazed at how reasonably priced it was, around $30-35 for Prix Fixe I think? (I ordered off menu, can't remember exactly, but prices were good.) Great wait staff, very friendly to our child, very accomodating with food requests. Food was good--I had trout, husband had striped bass or something like that. Son had mashed potatoes. Headed out to show after that. We saw Wicked -- our son has seen other plays, though obviously not on Broadway, and we prepared him well in advance by downloading the music ahead of time and watching the Wizard of Oz several times before our trip and talking about thematic elements of the Wicked story. Though we'd been warned about intensity, etc I felt it would be ok to give it a shot and our plan was to just leave immediately if he even flinched. (At least we would have tried it, never know till you try!) From the time we walked into the theater he was totally enthralled. He loved the set even outside teh seating area! Once we sat down he literally sat on the edge of his seat until intermission. I knew he would enjoy the experience but I did not expect him to truly ENJOY it this much...it was so cool to watch him! And the show, my goodness, it was great! The costumes and lighting and set are just incredible. Definitely one of my favorites. Story even makes you really think, and re-think! After intermission son got a little sleepy but he hung in there, sat well in his seat and watched the whole thing till the end. I told him he could go to sleep in his chair if he wanted to but he said, "No mommy, I have to see what happens to her!" Loved it. We strolled down Broadway just a block or two to grab a cab to come home after the show.

Saturday another mom and son day due to husband's conference. We had breakfast in the hotel and then headed to Central Park, this time on the subway. We rode a horse and carriage to get an overview, which he loved, then we walked over to the playground and let him burn off some energy there. Big rocks made me super nervous so we left there and went to the carousel, then to the ice rink to watch skaters. Contemplated the zoo but FAO Schwartz was calling so we headed there instead, had a ball of course. I always forget how much I love that place!

Son was getting a little tired so I told him to just try to nap in the stroller while I walked around a bit. He had a hard time falling asleep for looking at everything around us so we grabbed a quick bite at a pizza place on Lexington (some kind of bread company?), then with a full tummy he was out like a light. So....I went shopping! I hit La Boutique Resale and found a Hermes tie for hubby and Rena Lange pants that fit me to a "T" -- so perfect I wore them that evening! Then we went over a block to Tatiana's -- son woke up while in her store and she and he chatted so long I thought we might just spend the rest of our weekend there. She was awesome, can't wait to go back to her store. Great prices, beautiful clothing and accessories. I bought a pretty bracelet (Judith Ripka), wore it that same evening also.

For dinner we had made reservations to include another couple, some friends we know professionally who were at the same conference. They didn't mind our son tagging along, so we were happy to get to have dinner with friends. I was looking so forward to eating at Chanterelle and they did not disappoint! This was one of the best meals I have ever eaten. The service was exquisite. The food was delicious...and it just kept on coming! The dining room was lovely, everything was just PERFECT. It was truly a lovely dining experience. Thank you Thin and mp for the excellent suggestion! Thankfully our son behaved like a little prince, and was treated to a trip to Toys R Us in Times Square afterwards! We rode the Ferris Wheel and let him spend his saved-up piggy bank money before turning in for the night.

Sunday we got up early and had breakfast at the hotel, which was good but not great, but I didn't want to spend our time travelling around the city for brunch instead of doing some more sightseeing. ( *sigh, never enough time in nyc* ) After breakfast we headed down to Rockefeller Center and went to Top of the Rock, which was another excellent Fodors suggestion. If anyone is even considering the Empire State Building over TOTR, please do not think twice and just do the TOTR, as it is a much more pleasant experience with literally no lines!!!

We played around Rockefeller Center for awhile, hit Nintendo World, played a bunch of Wii games (made a list of good gift ideas for later) and watched more ice skating. Took a cab back downtown and got out at site of World Trade Center. This was perhaps my biggest shock--it's been awhile since I have been down there and it amazed me that it is now totally a construction site, with the visitors center now open. It is just a lot different than it was right after the attack when everything was still sort of untouched and you could still see the shrine where visitors had left notes and flowers and all. I mean, duh, like that would still be like that today, but it just surprised me to see the big contrast. It was special to see the firestation almost like a museum now, and my son really didn't get it all, but I could tell he knew something very important had happened there. I got a very moving picture of his hand reaching out to touch the burned helmets of the firefighters. My husband loved learning that they have excavated enough steel to make a warship.

After we left there we walked back to the hotel to retrieve our bags and catch a car back to the airport. As we left we asked our son what his favorite part of NYC was. He said "Everything. I want to live here!" Like his parents. He's hooked. We'll be back shortly!