VISITING NEW YORK CITY

If you think NYC seems like the least baby-friendly city in the world, think again. OK, so there are definitely some hurdles you’ll have to overcome (like don’t expect any of the elevators at the subway stations to actually work, or the rush hour crowds to excitedly part for your giant stroller), but if you're planning a trip here and want to bring along baby, there are loads of things to do. Below is a list of the best baby/toddler friendly museums and attractions in town, as well as a some of our more amazing playgrounds. I'm not going to list the most baby-friendly hotels or restaurants, but you'd be surprised at how accommodating almost everyone is when it comes to children here. Listen, I know a baby who celebrated his one-year birthday by eating foie gras at Per Se Salon. I'm freaking serious.

MUSEUMS

The American Museum of Natural History is a no-brainer, especially since it's cool for adults too. The mammal hall, full of stuffed animals from bears to bison, is particularly fun to visit, unless your toddler is like mine and is totally scared of taxidermy. Also, on Mondays at 10:15 and 11am there is story time for toddlers in the Discovery Room.

The Children's Museum of Manhattan is usually overlooked by most visitors who prefer to hit up the Met, Guggenheim and Whitney, but it is a fantastic place for babies and toddlers. There's an entire floor called PlayWorks devoted to kids from birth-4yrs old, and features a talking dragon, a mini deli and fire truck, a giant lite bright, sandbox and a soft play space for crawlers.

Children's Museum of the Arts is more of an interactive play space, down in Tribeca. (A cool neighborhood where some of the city's wealthiest families—and Robert DeNiro!—live.) They offer plenty of hands on classes and storytimes for kids o-5, and you can just drop in on the classes on Mon, Wed, Thurs and Fri from 10:45am-12pm. You can also hit up the WEE art studio anytime during the regular museum hours and play with chalk, playdough, etc.

Central Park Zoo is a must—kids go crazy for the penguin feeding everyday at 10:30am and 2:30pm. Actually, check out Central Park in its entirety. It may sound trite, but there are lots of playgrounds and open spaces for kids to run around it, and you can rent a bike and do the entire loop. (Central Park Bike Rentals offer kids seats.) Not a lot of people know about the free fishing for kids at the very Northern end of the park, at the Harlen Meer. Worth checking out if your kid is a little older.

PLAYGROUNDS

Union Square Playground. A great playground in a great location, and surrounded by tons of eateries and shops. There's plenty of bucket swings, a toddler section, and in the summer, a water fountain and misters. Oh, and the flooring is rubber mats so you don't have to stress about scraped up knees.

Imagination Playground at South Street Seaport Giant foam blocks, mats, wagons and a giant sandbox encourage all sorts of crazy fee play. While you're down here, you can take a ride on a water taxi over to Brooklyn and check out the Pier 6 playground. (One of my favorites.) They have their own mini water park in the summer, a sandbox village, slide mountain, and tons of swings. It also has some of the best views of the NY skyline from the other side of the river. If you're hungry (and don't mind standing on a long line) hit up Grimaldi's afterwards for lunch.

TIPS ON BRINGING KIDS TO NYC

*Taxis don't have car seats but will allow babies being carried in Bjorns and Ergos, etc in the backseat. You have to put the seatbelt between you and the baby though, not OVER the carrier.

*If you have a stroller and are taking the subway, just ask someone to help you carry it down or up. The biggest misconception about New Yorkers is that we are rude. We are in fact totally helpful and for the most part, friendly. (Just don't take up the ENTIRE sidewalk.)

*Don't just bring a flimsy, throwaway umbrella stroller. Bring the sturdiest one you have. You'll be walking a lot, and NY sidewalks can be unpredictable.

*Don't bring a toddler to a Broadway show, even if it's something kid-friendly like Lion King or Mary Poppins. People pay a lot of money to see these shows, and a wailing kid can really ruin the experience for everyone.

I have tons of other ideas/tips etc. on having fun with babies in New York but don't want this post to be overly long. But hit me up if you have any questions on things to do with a young one in the city that never sleeps. (Though hopefully the kids does.)

BEST BABY/TODDLER SWIMMING POOL ACCESSORY

One of our favorite trips to take is visiting grandparents in Florida. The flight from New York is around two hours (totally manageable, even alone) and they already have a car seat, stroller, pack n' play, and a whole slew of toys so I don't need to lug much with us. Not to mention—they have a pool, and both Momma and baby like to swim. (Ok, Momma likes to lay out.) Because we go down there so often, we've tried almost EVERY baby floatation device on the market—water wings, swim vests with floaty inserts, infant life vests—but nothing has worked. They all seemed to either pull Charlie on his face, or onto his back and then his face. Plus, they were impossible to put on. This floating canopy is genius, and the only thing I truly recommend for the water. It keeps babies and toddlers completely afloat, and it keeps the sun off of them. (Kids usually pulls sun hats off immediately.) In fact, Charlie loves it so much, it's almost impossible to get him out of the thing. *Note that I have my own adult version, but without the canopy. Can someone make these things with a canopy??

BEST IPAD APP FOR TODDLERS

Prior to our big Alaskan adventure, we bought an iPad and loaded it with tons of baby-friendly apps and Yo Gabba Gabba videos in the hopes it would keep our son semi-occupied on the various flights. Well, he just wanted to press the home button the whole time, so it was mostly a major fail except for this Itsy Bitsy Spider app. I swear it captured his attention for fifteen full minutes in baby time. That's 4 and a half hours in adult time. It's weird, yet oddly genius. I kind of had more fun with it than Charlie did.

CRUISING TOGETHER

I seriously never thought that I would be the kind of person to go on a cruise. I prefer traveling with nothing more than a map, a car, and no real plans, but when my husband had to go on an Alaskan cruise for work and got to bring us along, I totally jumped at the chance. Mostly I wanted to see what the buffet was like, but I'd also always had a strange fascination with cruise ships, especially after reading the much-loved David Foster Wallace essay on luxury ships years ago.

So without really knowing what to expect, we took a squirmy 16-month-old on a cross-country flight, then another small plane, then a freaky ass Northern Exposure style puddle jumper to get to Homer, Alaska. We then took a boat, and had to drive for three hours until we got to the cruise port. Oh, did I not mention there were no car seats available at Hertz in Homer? Nor baby stores open that sold them? So I had to sit in the back with Charlie strapped to me in his Ergo, both of us sweating and whining for several hours? Trust me, there were easier ways to get there, but we seem to thrive on pain.

After we finally got there, I have to admit, the cruise was kind of cool. It's basically a floating resort, but there is something really strange and wonderful about waking up and being able to look out your porthole and right onto the sea and floating pieces of ice going by. The buffet was not as awesome as I was hoping for (kinda cafeteria food-like) but the rest of the restaurants were delicious. (One of them turned into Le Cirque one night, with the exact Le Cirque NYC menu.) And at night we had babysitters, so drank lots of wine and saw the shows and basically laughed the whole time about everything from the absurdity of some of the events to the towel monkeys our steward would leave for us in the room.

I wrote an article about Cruising with Babies for NewParent.com, so go over there and read it for full details and tips. All in all, it's something I would probably do again, but I'd definitely go to a warmer destination so I could sip cocktails by the pool and hit up some private islands. I'd also go on a line that had daycare or a kid's club that my kid could go to so I could get a little break during the day, and maybe I'd try to do it with another family or friends or even my parents. Not that it's going to happen anytime soon—I had vertigo for three days after docking, and am only now starting to get my balance back. So another cruise will have to wait for another time.