100 things to do with your kids in NY before they grow up
It’s New Year’s, time to set goals and contemplate how we can make this year different from the year before. This year I want to focus on spending more meaningful time with my children and do more to take advantage of living in New York. To that end, I have created what I call a Life List for Raising NYC Kids.
A life list is a list of things you want to achieve in your lifetime. This life list is all the things I hope to experience with my kids in New York before they grow up. Not just the stuff that is fun to do, but the stuff that I think will be important to do with them. The things that will shape them and be formative in their experience as little New Yorkers. The things that they will remember as adults and cherish as part of the cool experience of growing up in New York.
Now, off I go to wring every drop of goodness from that damp, dirty rag that is New York City…
Life List for NYC Kids
(or 100 things to do with your kids before they grow up)
- Visit the NY Hall of Science
- Go on an audition just for the heck of it
- Wave to the cameras on The Today Show
- Have tea at the Plaza
- Ride the Shark Boat
- Climb the Statue of Liberty
- Ride the row boats in Central Park
- Go to Dylan’s Candy Bar
- Go to Economy Candy
- Get locked up at the Police Museum
- Go kayaking on the hudson
- Take the ferry to Sandy Hook beach
- Ride a horse-drawn carriage in Central Park
- Have dim sum in Brooklyn’s Chinatown
- Go hiking in the Staten Island Greenbelt
- See the new Liberty Science Center
- Go fishing in the East River
- Go on a fishing boat from Sheepshead Bay
- See the money train at the Transit Museum
- Go to the Brooklyn Children’s Museum
- Get a taste of country life at the Queens Farm Museum
- Ride on a tug boat
- Sail on the historic schooner Pioneer
- Sail in the hudson
- Take a helicopter ride
- ride the Cyclone before it’s gone
- Grab the ring at the Coney Island carousel
- Spend my wad at Dave and Buster’s Arcade
- march in the Mermaid Parade
- Go to a Brooklyn Cyclone’s game
- Fulfill a child’s wish through operation santa claus
- See the ballet
- Watch a dress rehearsal of an opera at the Met
- Sleep over at the Bronx Zoo
- See the unicorns at the Cloisters
- Go horseback riding
- Go sledding in Central Park
- Cross-country ski down a city street
- Bike across the Brooklyn Bridge and get ice cream at the Brooklyn Ice Cream Factory
- Take the Roosevelt Island Tram
- See the piano dancers at FAO
- Visit the Sony Wonder Technology Lab
- Children’s Museum of Manhattan
- Children’s Museum of the Arts
- Sketch at Metropolitan Museum of Art
- Stargaze at the Hayden Planetarium
- See the rest of the AMNH after the dinosaurs and mammals
- Visit the top of the Empire State Building
- Take an art class at the MoMA
- Chinese Scholar’s Garden in Staten Island
- Cherry Blossom Festival at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden
- Holiday Train Show at NY Botanical Garden
- Check out the Queens Zoo
- See the wandering wallabies at the Prospect Park Zoo
- Watch a movie under the stars
- Madame Tussauds
- Try all the flavors at the Chinatown Ice Cream Factory
- Look up relatives in Ellis Island
- Visit new waterside playground in Chelsea
- Get colonial at the Fraunces Tavern Museum
- Do a medieval workshop at Cathedral of St John the Divine
- The Lower East Side Tenement Museum
- See the rollerbladers perform in Central Park (just West of the Sheep’s Meadow)
- Fly a kite on the Sheep Meadow
- See Shakespeare in the Park
- Going biking on Governor’s Island
- Find the secret Downing Street Playground in the Village
- Explore Battery Park City Parks from the South Cove to Penny Park
- Ride the Staten Island Ferry
- Have knishes and egg creams at Yonah Schimmel’s
- See the giant buddha in the Mahayana temple
- The Skyscraper Museum
- Play vintage video games at The Museum of Moving Image
- The Museum of the American Indian
- Buy comic books at Forbidden Planet
- Free concert in Madison Square Park and Get lunch at the Shake Shack
- Buy flowers from the flower district
- Buy wholesale toys in the wholesale district (27th and 6th)
- Swing Clubs at the Chelsea Piers Driving Range
- Climb the rock wall on Broadway
- Visit the Science Barge
- Visit the Intrepid
- Test out the Whispering Gallery at Grand Central
- Coney Island Arcade
- Cook our own food in a Korean restaurant
- Sail boats on the boat pond in Central park
- Billy Johnson Rustic Playground in Central Park
- Explore Belvedere Castle
- Medieval Festival in Fort Tryon Park
- Ride the carousel in Bryant park
- See the to scale panorama of the City of New York at the Queens Museum of Art
- Get Egyptian at the Brooklyn Museum of Art
- See the new Greeks and Romans at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
- Go ice skating in Prospect Park
- Riverbank State Park carousel
- See the holiday lights in Dyker Heights
- Take a trapeze lesson
- See the Macy’s Thanksgiving Parade balloons get inflated
- Watch the circus elephants march into town
- Swim in the floating barge pool
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Filed under: By Age: Baby, By Age: Big Kids, By Age: Little Kids, By Age: Toddler, Indoor Activities, Outdoor Activities















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Great idea for starting the New Year. I have wanted to make a list like this (though not quite as comprehensive and with appropriate eats nearby!)
Girl, when do you sleep?! This is awesome.
Izzy’s Mama,
Yum. I want a where to eat with kids in NY life list. Please, if you ever do that let’s cross post!
Hey Mommy Poppins and Izzy’s Mama,
Great post!! I can’t wait to get started.
Time Out Kids has an awesome list of kid eats. Check it out here:
http://www.timeout.com/newyork/kids/articles/features/10703/best-in-chow
For those of you that take your kids on the Roosevelt Island Tram (#40) try to schedule in some extra time to walk down to Southpoint Park to throw a frisbee around, have a picnic, etc and give your kids a 360 degree view of Manhattan and Queens from one of the few undeveloped pieces of land left in NYC.
And if you come by during the Summer watch for our Saturday Night Summer Movie series on that same stretch of land where you can watch movies with the Manhattan skyline lit up at night. This way you can knock out # 55 as well
http://rooseveltisland360.blogspot.com/2007/08/my-first-southpoint-movie-experience.html
Well, 21 off of your list is pretty good with my oldest being 5! Thanks for all the new ideas!
#33-I tried to see H and G’s dress rehearsal but it was mis-advertised. They had already given away all seats to school groups….so not sure how doable that one is to the average mommy joe and her kids….do you know any insider info on that?
What a great list!! Here’s my submission….
Go on the Uptown Treasures Tour!! This is FREE (for the bus that takes you around to 8 northern Manhattan attractions) and offered in the Fall.
101. Climb up the High Bridge Water Tower to the top floor and take in the views of the Harlem River. Just 174 steps up the spiral staircase and great foto opps, esp. of the stairs and views. This is only open on select days, one of them the Uptown Treasures Tour day.
102. Tour the Morris Jumel Mansion. George Washington’s headquarters during the Revolutionary War. www.morrisjumel.org
103. Visit the Dyckman Farmhouse Museum on Uptown Treasures tour day and press your own fresh apple cider. www.dyckmanfarmhouse.org
www.uptowntreasures.org
Since I’m only living here for a short time, we’ve had to fast-forward our visits to the various places on the list and we’ve seen lots of things in the city that never sleeps. Happy New Year!
The High Bridge sounds really cool. Great off the beaten track tips. Thanks!
Hi There!
I like your site & energy, but have a HUGE suggestion. Because many of us get way too much email, you should TITLE each of your many many emails. That way, no searching need be done. I’d look and see:
Mommy Poppins - 100 Things To Do List
for example and be able to differentiate from the other emails from you I haven’t been able to get to yet and may just erase in a clump out of time frustration.
It may take you a couple more seconds, but would be deeply appreciated by your readers. Urban Baby and Daily Candy Kids both do that already.
Happy New Year,
Alyson
Alyson,
I know…this has been an issue and a bunch of people brought it up in our reader survey. The service I use doesn’t allow this. I’ve tried. I need ot switch to a different service. I will look into that as soon as I get the site design totally finished. Promise.
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Absolutely wonderful list! I’d add (unless I missed it?) take a walk over the Brooklyn Bridge and have a pizza at Grimaldi’s, and an ice cream at the B’klyn Ice Cream Factory.
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i love everything on this list except the horse-drawn carriages and the circus. i want to teach my children to be respectful and kind to animals, and those two operations do not cut it.