Tag Archives: New York City

Conferences, Photo-A-Day, Toys, Travel

Toy Fair 2015 – Day 3


Photo-A-Day #3602

Today at Toy Fair was a fast and furious one. The weather was threatening to either cancel or delay my train home so Derek and Keri offered to take me home with them early. This meant that I’d be making some changes to my appointment schedule. So I was off and running from the moment that I got to the Javitis Center in the morning. Snow was on the ground and falling as I made my way over, my first time in New York when it was actually snowing. I never see snow in New York, it is always so well maintained but this tie it was actually falling. Luckily I was a quick trip around the corner.

I was bringing home a ton of toys but I packed so light and efficiently that I only had one extra bag full of toys to lug around. I stowed my stuff and went to try and get some appointments moved around. Luckily I was able to hit everything on the bottom floor right off early in the morning and then I didn’t have to run up and down the stairs over and over to get to appointments. I saw things like a Girl Scout Cookie Oven, a baseball bat that records your swings and gives you points in an app, cooking equipment for kids and so much more.

Then I went back upstairs and visited a bunch of booths with my friend Adam Cohen of Dada Rocks. We visited Bandai, LEGO, and Anki Overdrive. The cars above are Anki cars and they are incredible. Probably the most amazing things I saw at the show. Adam and I battled each other around the track a couple of times.

While we were at the show we recorded and episode of our podcast, Dad.fm. While we recorded we saw Seth Myers and his team walking around the booths to record segments for his show. We were also buzzed by many different kinds of remote control vehicles. It was a great time.

I was lucky to catch my ride with Derek and Keri. We left around 2pm and I was able to get home in time to surprise Eva and Andrew at the Spaghetti Supper fundraiser for her theater program. Allison had not told her that I was coming home early and she was super excited and surprised. The look on her face was priceless. I really appreciate that my friends were willing to give me a ride back with them.

Conferences, Photo-A-Day, Toys, Travel

Toy Fair 2015 – Day 1


Photo-A-Day #3600

For the third year in a row I attended Toy Fair in New York City. And for the third year in a row there was a major snow storm. I had worked overnight from home while the snow was falling and even got out and shoveled out my car at 2am. I got out a couple hours early and headed down to the train station. It was blizzard conditions and I was one of only four cars on the road. I did arrive safely and I was very surprised that my train was actually running. It was an hour late but it got me down to New York and I had time to make it to my appointments for the day.

I spent the rest of the day at the Toy Fair meeting with many different companies including Modarri. They have some new repaints and also some new body kits and even a tire pack coming out. The booth was set up with some PlayTape which looked like roads and also there were a bunch of custom made Modarri cars that artists in Santa Cruz created.

I then went to a bunch of appointments all over the main floor of Toy Fair. I hit Playmobil, I was not allowed to take any photos there and I really wanted to. There is a set of motorcycle figures that I really want to collect. They also had much more including some very cool stuff coming soon which I can’t talk about.

I went to the Crayola booth and was blown away by the Animation studio. This upcoming product incorporates the technology from the Virtual Design Pro studio and then allows kids to create animated movies by making a few simple moves to a wire-frame figure. This will be amazing and I am looking forward to working on movies with Eva.

I also visited the Playmates booth to see all of the great Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles that are coming for the year. I saw a little preview of where the line is going for the fourth season of the show. There were also some new Half Shell Heroes toys and all new playsets.

I finished up at the convention center and went to my hotel. The walk seemed shorter this year, which was good because I was exhausted. I got myself a couple of slices of pizza and ended up passing out dead asleep at 8:30pm. I woke at 4:30 am so I didn’t get the full amount of sleep I was hoping for but I slept pretty well.