amberwavestour: A City of Neighborhoods

We love the bridges, which we took all day - back and forth - going from neighborhood to neighborhood

is what we had read about Pittsburgh. Yes, it's a large city, but it feels much more like a city of neighborhoods. Starting our day at the Toonseum in the Central Business District and ending it at nearly 1:00 a.m. as we took our second trip of the day to Mt. Washington, we resoundingly agree.

Find your favorite! :)

The Toonseum, a tiny little museum devoted to comic books, is so charming and SMALL that you might expect it's situated in a town like Middlebury, Vermont (with their wonderful Sheldon museum, that is actually much bigger and older, but has a similar small town feel - and also lets the kids play dress up! :) That is... until you take a gander at their casually posted autographed canvas, which keeps growing panel by panel, and realize the artists and celebrities who have stood in that same modest space.

Daniel was delighted to find Big Nate author and illustrator Lincoln Pierce had been to the Toonseum

Iron Man says hello, while Dana navigates our next destination and Maddie takes a selfie :)

Daniel "The Riddler" Gallup dons an appropriate hat

This is the entrance to room #2 of the Toonseum :)

Maddie really liked playing dress up! (and capturing the images)

We only had just over an hour devoted to exploring this museum, but that turned out to be just the right amount of time. We perused the Reuben award winners over the past 60 years, an exhibit that is typically housed in San Francisco's cartoon museum, but the Toonseum is proudly occupying it in one of their two rooms for the near future - Learn about The Reuben

We only got seven of the 14 scavenger hunt questions right - and leave it to a comic book/cartoon museum to create one of the most crazy, challenging, impossible to answer without cheating (and we refused to cheat! :) fun activities for a family that I've ever seen. Still, lots of fun, then on to our next neighborhood.... brunch in the Southside, specifically The Grand Concourse, a magnificently restored railroad station that now houses Pittsburgh's favorite place for special occasions. The food was plentiful and good (but not great, something we notice of many brunches), but this stop is ALL about the location.

Daniel checks out the stained glass windows

Formerly the Pittsburgh and Lake Erie station, this building was first constructed in 1901 and looks exactly as it did during its years as a grand concourse. The tile floor is identical, the curved wood benches, the bathrooms, complete with huge windows and opulent curtains, everything... definitely worth a visit if you're ever in Pittsburgh.

Enjoying the view of downtown from the Southside

Once we'd gotten our fill of food and view, we had a momentary exchange with Star, the parking attendant, whose "foot pedal" had been taken away, making it utterly impossible for her to let us out without paying $3.00, when we arrived - literally (think Rob Lowe in Parks and Rec, if you watch that show) two minutes past our two hour validated parking time (the kids and Dana enjoyed mocking my incredulity for the next hour, so I guess that was worth the three bucks for them!), we headed to The Warhol. As you can see, Maddie was ready, as

she chose to wear her Warhol inspired soup shirt, which we had picked up on a trip to an awesome store (UNIQLO) in New York (thanks to Ron, who took us there! :) We learned that Warhol was born and raised in Pittsburgh (in the Oakland neighborhood, on the same block - within a few houses of the house where Dan Marino grew up), attended Carnegie Mellon (which I've gained tremendous fondness for ever since reading Randy Pausch's The Last Lecture) before he moved to New York to become the Warhol we all know (and some of us love)

After another unpleasant encounter with a parking attendant, we snagged a street spot and realized that parking is free on Sunday, so off we went to explore. Located in the North Shore neighborhood (also home to PNC park, where the Pirates play),

the museum was opened in 1994 and is apparently the largest museum in the WORLD dedicated to a single artist. Of course, some of his most iconic paintings are housed in MOMA, so here there are six floors exploring some of the more bizarre and fascinating aspects of Warhol's work, including his many experiments with film. The kids enjoyed sitting for their own three minute film, which will be sent to our e-mail for anyone who desires more than these still photos provide :)

Daniel poses, while Maddie reads about the rationale behind this process

Playing an imaginary violin...

Or striking a serious pose... how do you want to be immortalized on the screen, Warhol asks.

Maddie first selects her lighting - how many of those spots will shine on you?

then lets the camera go to work

Technically, you're not allowed to take photographs anywhere within the Warhol museum, but I thought it was relatively innocuous to snap a few photos of my own children in Warhol's silver studio. The only other shots I sneakily took were of Daniel watching one of Warhol's short films, Maddie noticing Lyle Lovett on the cover of one of Warhol's Interview magazines (in the room devoted to them) and Maddie in the gift shop. Luckily, nobody threw me out for these transgressions! :)

I really like this shot for some reason

We're going to see him in Birmingham!!!

Take the photo, Mom... They get it....

After the museum visit, we headed to several neighborhoods for exploring and shopping - Shadyside, Mt. Washington, and The Strip. Of the three, Shadyside was my favorite. Of course, the fact that a t-shirt in one quirky shop window boasts, "Shadyside: 10, 878 rich white people can't be wrong" made me somewhat sheepish about my appreciation for this wonderful little community. I speculated (correctly) that Shadyside also had a large gay population, as I was getting the Palm Springs vibe I got last year in California, this one seemingly quaint little street had an Apple store sitting on it. An Apple store?! The Strip has a farmer's market feel - where one specialty food shop borders the next; this is where Pittsburgh's best chefs likely come to shop for the day's specials. And we took the Dusquene incline (operating since the late 1800's) to Mt. Washington for some stunning views of Pittsburgh.


We've dubbed Pittsburgh the "city of bridges," and we love each more than the next!

After dinner at The Spoon (located in the thriving East Liberty neighborhood and considered by many to be the best restaurant in Pittsburgh - it was lovely and warm and delicious), we headed to Squirrel Hill (a Jewish enclave) to watch The Way, Way Back in The Manor, a movie theater that has been operating since it opened in 1922. I adored the neighborhood, the film and the theater, which was just as gracious as could be. We capped off the night with a drive back up to Mt. Washington to see Pittsburgh at night. What a glorious day! Top 10 cities in the world, I don't know, but certainly add us to the list of Pittsburgh enthusiasts!