Meet the Muir Family: 1st subway adventure

We have lived here a little over 3 months now and it's taken me this long to gather up the courage to take both the kids by myself on the subway. I have taken both kids on the bus before and taxis are a walk in the park, but the subway is a different story. I know what you're thinking; it's just a subway but when you factor in the two kids under 3 (one of which can't yet walk), an umbrella stroller, backpack, stairs, metrocard, the subway turnstile, fast subways whizzing by, and only one mommy who doesn't yet know all the subway lines and directions that they run in, you can understand my hesitation.

So today I took the plunge and after a little encouragement from some of my NYC mom's I went for it and decided to venture out of the Upper East Side. We took the bus to the subway station. The bus picks us up right in front of our apt. building and takes us about 8 blocks to the subway. On the bus, Mikey kept telling this old lady sitting beside him "Mommy, Katie baby, Mike, choo choo train." Needless to say he was excited to go on the subway.

After getting on the bus, picture me carrying Katie in the baby carrier, umbrella stroller over my shoulder, back pack on my back and Mikey holding onto my hand we went down the stairs to the subway where I went thru the turnstile first after swiping my metrocard, then instructed Mikey to follow. We went down even more stairs to catch the 4 subway line, which is so far under ground that we would survive a nuclear attack. (Yikes, I tried not to think of that while we were down there.) Mikey was very well behaved since there were lots of new sights and sounds to take in. Katie happily looked around and waved to people. The 4 subway line is the express line. The 6 subway line is the local line.

After 3 stops we were at Union Square where we then transferred to the 6 subway line. After 2 more stops were were offically in SoHo. It's a very hip, young, trendy part of NYC. Apparently there are lots of celebs that live in this part of Manhattan but we didn't see any.

We did a little shopping and walked around to take in the sites. We stumbled upon a park called Washington Square Village Park. Mikey was beyond excited thisgo play however when we got to the entrance, it was locked. Apparently this playground was accessed by key entry only to residents who live in the area. I began to explain to Mikey that we weren't able to get in because we didn't have a key but stopped about half way thru once I realized that this 2 year old wasn't going to give up. He was determined to get in!! So we waited and after a few minutes another mom showed up and we piggybacked off her and walked right in.

This playground was pretty great. As we venture to different playgrounds, I've realized that it must meet certain criteria for me to consider it a good playground. Not to small, but not to big that I'd have to follow him to keep him in my site, an isolated sandbox, appropriate play ground equipment for his age. This playground had all that in addition to TONS of toys. Toys that you'd find in anyones back yard. There were even a few toys that I recognized that we have in our home. This was complete heaven!

I was happy to give the kids a new experience and gain confidence knowing that I can handle two kids anywhere in the city by any means of transportation! Mission successful!!

I only have some pics. of us at the park as I was to busy to take pics on the subway.