Last Hurrah with Shawn

Monday, September 30, 2013 TJ & Vanessa 0 Comments

In August, my family decided to LIVE IT UP during Shawn's last week before he left on his two-year church mission. Although he needed time to catch up on errands, buy missionary attire and pack, we found time to fit in a beach day, family time, visiting relatives, movies and more.

Road trip to the Jersey Shore
Left to right: My toes, Marissa's toes and Shawn's farmers tan in the sand 

Squinty eyes means it was a perfectly sunny beach day!
Someone convinced me to grab a board and run in the ocean. It turned out to be more like taking a beating with sand that was falling out of strange places of my swimsuit for the next three hours straight.


I also played tour guide, as we took visiting relatives who came from Utah for Shawn's farewell, to tour just a couple fun spots in the Big Apple.

Central Park


In one day, I kept our group busy. We ventured through the west side of Central Park and Grand Central...

...saw the Manhattan LDS Temple.
Took a couple subway rides, enjoyed the views from the top of The Empire State Building, and ate a delicious lunch at Shake Shack in Madison Square Park with views of the Flatiron Building....

My cute parents

We waved to TJ who was stuck at work.  Look just left of the MetLife building at the tall, hexagon-shaped building and you might see him too!



After taking in the views from up high, we hit the ground in Chinatown and Little Italy.
I dragged the group around via subway so they could have the "real" New Yorker experience.
My cousin wasn't too sure about some of the food he saw in the Chinatown markets
"I'll try it if you try it"

Time was flying, as most of the day was already over at this point, so we took off for the lower tip of Manhattan to catch the ferry to enjoy The Statue of Liberty from one of my favorite "rides". Come visit me and there's a good chance I'll make you ride the ferry too!



Check out that pose of the girl to the right of my Aunt...she's got it down!

Father-Son photo opp - just missing Tyson who was still in Japan for his summer internship :(
It was an awesome week, but bittersweet. I love my family. I hate goodbyes. However, I wouldn't want anything else more than this opportunity for my brother at this time in his life.

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