Happy New Year!

Since moving to Austin the children have been missing snow and rather sadly our 6 year old claims she doesn't even remember the snow we had every winter in England...so we decided to head to New York for Christmas, the city which can rival England with its low temperatures and would you believe it...New York had the warmest Christmas Day since records began!

Christmas Eve arrives and we flew directly to New York for the start of a four night Christmas city break, we stayed in Times Square and after finding our extremely small bedroom we went straight out to explore before it got dark, we chose to walk everywhere as this is another thing we all miss being in Austin.

We found our way to Bryant Park which actually had tonnes more to do and see than we realised but after browsing through the Christmas market stalls we pitched up and watched people ice skating with a drink each.

Bryant Park

Reporting on the events of Christmas Eve in New York

After taking in the sights of Times Square we came across a British Pub and decided to head in there for dinner. We are usually a bit skeptical about British food abroad but surprisingly the food actually tasted very similar to home, we squeezed in a quick visit to the Rockefeller Center.

Afterwards we bought some wine to have a night cap in our room after the girls were asleep and we also bought a carrot to leave out for Rudolph ;)

We woke early on Christmas Day to find Father Christmas had left presents in our stockings which were perched at the end of the beds, always an excitable moment cue lots of screams and excitement from the girls! We then headed downstairs for breakfast which was basic and self serve but who cares when you are with your own little family on Christmas Day in New York...

We had been desperate to get to Central Park and luckily with the weather being warm and us staying in Times Square we were able to walk there easily.

Family in England began to Skype whilst we walked we are so used to talking to family and friends on Skype that it didn't feel too strange to be so far away from them all even though it was Christmas Day. We of course miss them all very much ;)

Christmas dinner was at a restaurant called The Writing Room with another English family and some of my husbands work colleagues, although the decor was not necessarily Christmas-y it was fun and exciting to get the children together and have drinks and a laugh with everyone.

Boxing Day arrived and we had booked tickets in advance for the American Museum of Natural History, we loved it here and well I think I'll just let the photos speak for themselves...

The day after Boxing Day we planned to go to the One World Observatory Building next to the 9/11 memorial unfortunately that particular day is was too foggy to see anything.

The weather had become pretty cold that day as we were already there we spent some time walking through the 9/11 memorials, even though it was busy including young families it was eerily quiet and peaceful.

That afternoon was spent doing some shopping and sightseeing down Fifth Avenue...

On the morning of 28th it was time to fly back to Austin however rather annoyingly our flight was cancelled but by lunchtime we finally had a flight to Atlanta booked as it was late we had to stay in a hotel there too...

The following morning we caught a flight to Dallas THEN we had to hire a car in Dallas and drive three hours back to Austin, as you can imagine after such an amazing time in New York I was not happy and after receiving my strongly worded complaint letter United Airlines gave us an apology and a voucher for $400.

Leaving this post on a happy note, even though I still suffer from sporadic homesickness I came across a UKTV box which streams all UK channels onto your TV wherever you are in the world, its costing me $30 a month and its worth every penny so far! UKTV Everywhere